Your smile seems so real. How have we turned out? Do you still love her? Is she still your everything? Is mom still alive or are we talking to her ghost? I bet you’ve done something amazing with your life. Been better than I could ever imagine. Do your eyes still light up when thunder strikes? Or do you fear the way it booms like she did? Do you dress the same way, or have you chosen to be “normal” like the rest? Do you think you’re pretty?

My smile is genuine this time, not something to please others. We’ve turned out alright, but I’ve realized that 28 is still a child compared to how long I want to live. I still love her, and she loves us. Everyone knows now and I hope to call her my fiancée one day. She is my world.

Mom died last December, cancer like dad but so different I suppose. We don’t talk to her ghost much, not like how we did with dad. We miss him more, I think, then her, maybe because her death feels like a void that was already there. I’m actually a teacher; it’s hard work but I think I’m doing amazing at it. They make me smile. It’s not the life I thought I might have had, but I think that’s okay. I still love thunder and rain; It washes away the heaviness of my soul. It hasn’t rained the same in years. I miss it, like an old friend. I dress in what makes me happy which hasn’t changed much, but now I’m learning to love my body even it’s a hard thing to do. Normal is still overrated, but that’s okay, too. I have days were I catch myself in the mirror and I can’t believe this is me. I look beautiful and I’m glowing. There are days I feel like a gremlin and some I am just happy I have someone who loves me in every fashion.

My life continues and I’m glad you were apart of its journey.

Style score 82%

My mourning is not breaking apart on the bathroom floor at 3 in the morning. It is not the inconsolable heaviness in my body that refuses to get up, even though the world is still moving on with them. My mourning will never be the same as yours and yet, mine is deemed wrong. You say I’m cold and that something has to be wrong with me because people whose loved one just died don’t act this way. But Your mourning has you broken into tiny pieces. My mourning was putting those pieces back together so I could have a mother. I was mourning not 1 but 2 parents that year. I got myself to school, got top grades and made sure you didn’t kill yourself in the middle of the night to join your husband. You’ve misunderstood my sorrow for as long I can remember. My sorrow has always come from my soul, leaving tiny cracks in its wake, growing deeper and deeper with every poison word, every whimper from your mouth. My mourning never got to be on the outside to showcase for you that I am “sad”. My mourning was private, tears dripping down my face as I listened to the songs I shared with him. Silent screams echoed through the night as I held myself close, so I had something other than the sound of my heart breaking to focus on. You’ve misunderstood me…but when has that been any different than before?
Style score 92%

PHOBOS

Dear Phobos,

I felt you trickle down my spine like the first heat wave of the summer sun’s rays.

The same warmth that kissed my pale flesh in the morning glow in every year since my birth.

I sensed your lingering touch like that of my mother’s lips against my brow, as she checks to see the rhythm of my chest.

I taste your sweet wonders with every bite of ripe fruit, decadent chocolate.

I see you my wife’s eyes every night before we fall asleep. Her soft voice, a siren’s call to my dreams, luring me into rest. Another second closer to the eternal end.

Phobos is my friend. He is my father, carrying me to bed as a child again. Phobos is my steady hum of music in the air. Phobos is my friend in a new body, showing me the wonders of life and thereafter.

My Phobos, my fear is to forget.

I fight this fear daily. With every moment I gain, I lose another second of life. I am not afraid of death. I am not afraid of life. I am afraid to forget the memories and moments I created, so I make more and more hoping that I will forget…

My fear

(T) 100% style score