Category: Month 1

The pain of someone else’s birthday song

Eleven days after my sister’s death, sitting in a restaurant and hearing happy birthday was too much.

We went to Red Robin a few after we said our goodbyes at the funeral home. It was the four of us ⁠— our parents, my sister’s partner, and me. It was the first time we had gone out anywhere to eat or do much of anything. We watched a Memorial Day jet flyover in her honor and then went to eat. Eleven days in the After.

We prioritized ordering her favorite dishes ⁠— a pre-meal Oreo Cookie Magic Milkshake, some Clucks & Fries, a Whiskey River BBQ Chicken Wrap. These had been staples since middle school. We sat around the table doing our best to hold it together and look like a normal family out to lunch, but I know we were all lost in memories.

Memories of past meals at this and other Red Robins. Meals attached to high school sports and family dinners and then later to dates and fun life events. We were doing okay, until behind us the staff began a rousing round of the restaurant’s birthday song, wishing someone a happy 29th birthday.

29.

An age my sister would never get to be. Her time ended 7 months too early for that. An innocuous number that brought the world crashing down around us. We shrunk into our booth and avoided eye contact until we each had managed to bury back within ourselves the renewed grief.

I don’t have a witty end to this story, nor do I have some insightful way to turn it into something meaningful. Sometimes it just sucks to sit in the middle of a restaurant trying to survive when someone else’s celebration reminds you of all that you’ve lost.

What her death certificate doesn’t tell you

There are lines on my sister’s death certificate that haunt me because they’re so empty of the reality that lies behind them.

I viscerally remember sitting in the funeral home proofreading my sister’s death certificate. I made sure every letter was accurate ⁠— because I would not dare let this end cap to her story have a disrespectful clerical error ⁠— but the document broke me. That certificate is such a clinical record of the facts, messy and painful as they are. I wish the document forced everyone who read it to know not just the reported data but the humanity surrounding it.

Time/Date of Death: “Found 05:16 May 20, 2023”

Found 05:16 by her partner of six years, the morning before they were going to attend a friend’s wedding. Found 05:16 the day before they were going to meet up with our parents and go to an airshow. Found 05:16 in her bed, still warm, after which point her partner desperately tried to resuscitate her as his world crumbled around him.

Marital Status at Time of Death: Never Married

Never married because she and her partner already considered themselves married in all the ways that mattered. Never married because they were enjoying their lives and directing their money toward trips and a big purchase and time with friends. Never married because it was the inevitable end goal but not somewhere they felt the need to rush, having all the time in the world.

Never married but not unloved. She had found her forever, and in the end, he truly was her forever. Until her last night, she had the kind of love from her partner that most people think only happens in stories.

Never married in the eyes of the state, but married in her heart.

Cause of Death: PENDING FURTHER STUDIES

Pending four to six months of wait time due to state backlogs and insufficient resources. Pending further studies that will probably still not tell us what happened, if the information we got so far is any indication. The facts of that morning don’t make sense with what the physical autopsy found, and the two causes the detective mentioned on the phone are literally impossible.

Cause of death: one of the things keeping all of us up at night as we wonder how it happened, whether she felt any pain or was afraid, if there was something that could have changed the course of this tragic family history. Cause of death: a piece of information that will not heal any of these wounds but that would help give a name to the only place we can funnel our blame.

Manner of Death: Pending Investigation

Tragically. Unexpectedly. Suddenly. In a way that left a hole in her home, her community, her family, and the universe. Unnaturally, in that this is not how nature is supposed to claim its victims.

What it will actually likely say, when the report is finalized, is simply, “undetermined.” Science won’t even be good enough to give us an answer to the loudest WHY our hearts will scream the rest of our lives.