There are certain dates on the calendar that stick out in my mind, far more than the rest. Every year when one of them rolls around I can't help but spend the day remembering what I was doing on that day, so many years ago. With each year that passes you expect the pain to lessen some, but it never does. Each year they roll around, and I find myself seeking comfort in my otherwise empty bed, trying to keep the depression and tears at bay.
Some dates aren't as hard as others, like your birthday. On September 25th, I thumb through my recipe binder and bake your favorite cake, a three layer German Chocolate cake. Though I probably could bake it from memory. I turn to the page where you've crossed out the title and wrote, Paul's Abso-fucking-lutely Favorite above in pencil. The pages are yellowed and the pencil marks smudged and fading a bit.
Three birthdays ago I noticed how much the fading had progressed, from years of rubbing the imprinted paper and in a moment of panic, afraid that if it faded away, so would any memory of you, so I placed a strip of clear packing tape over your writing in hopes it would preserve it. Through the tape I can no longer feel the indents from your pencil strokes, but I rub them anyway remembering a little piece of you.
I'm not really a fan of German Chocolate cake, but on that day, I sit alone, in the darkened kitchen we once shared and have a slice. I flip through albums of our life together and smile at pictures of you on birthdays past.
My favorite will always be the one of your fifteenth birthday. You're sitting alone in a corner booth at our favorite fast food restraunt, wearing a god-awful 80s dress shirt with purple, green and yellow triangles covering the garment. It's atrocious really. You're looking down with your signature smirk gracing your lips. For the life of me I can't remember why.
I know most days I'm living in the past, my friends used to be sympathetic, now they tell me to move on. They tell me how long it's been, as if I need a reminder. I wish they understood what you meant to me and how I'll never be over you.
I never visit your tombstone anymore, there's no serenity to be found in the graveyard, and instead it only seems to instigate the nightmares of your death again.
At the end of the day, caring not that I never got dressed, brushed my hair. I climb into bed, curl y myself around the pillow I occasionally scent with your cologne and I weep. Thirteen years later it isn't any easier, and I still miss the keeper of my heart.