Silhouette

i don’t remember her. i can still remember the dusty old smell of her little bungalow. but i can’t hear her voice anymore, i can’t picture her frail face. that hurts, trying desperately to piece together memories to resemble something of a person, but nothing. we weren’t that close, but she was still family. I hadn’t seen her in years, but i should’ve made an effort. even when she kept getting admitted to hospital, i hated going to visit that place. it scared me, i sat quietly in the corner and stared out the window the whole time. i know i was young, but i should’ve known better, to talk to her, to take advantage of those times. that guilt now consumes me in a way i never thought imaginable. when she passed, i never even really processed it, i was so wrapped up in the mess of my own life, that i didn’t stop to think about it at all really. i never even went to the funeral. i never got a goodbye, closure, something to help aid the added pain to my heavy heart that i was so oblivious to then. i had so much going on that i convinced myself it was just another thing to add to the list, another thing to bury deep down and ignore. i somehow managed to convince myself that it didn’t affect me. that was, until last week, when i passed her house with the “for sale” sign crookedly stuck in the grass. seeing the remains of all she had left being given away, it killed me inside a little. it’s been almost a year now, and only now has it hit me that she’s gone, the small weak body that would cling for support as she hugged me and slipped money into my pocket, the same woman who watched us play with toy cars and count our piggy banks on the living room floor, she was gone. i’ll never again hear the nags that we missed something on the shopping list, and i know she frustrated people a lot, but it kind of made me laugh. she always slightly reminded me of myself in that way. she was stubborn — but in this, she pushed people away to the point where they were so agitated and only put up with her when essential. we’d slip the sunday paper through the letterbox, ring the bell, and run back to the car, driving away before she could reach the door. it makes me sick to my stomach. if i could just say sorry… she was alone, i always felt bad for her because even as a child, i knew that feeling all too well. it still hurts to think about how she died. they said the sheets stained with urine, the windows covered in flies, her stiff body spread across the bed. she was there for days before anyone found her. that scared me. what if i really do end up like her? what if i keep pushing people away? what if the universe has destined me to be alone? even when clearing out her house, it was filled with gadgets, gifts, utensils, furniture, so many things that were never touched. who knows how many years they’d been there. looking in from the outside you never could have guessed the random objects this woman held, from paintings and cake tins to clown statues and unopened christmas decorations. this house held the shell of a hollow life. she hadn’t left the house in years, relying on people for errands, she simply sat alone in her chair with her thoughts, trying desperately to keep up with the subtitles on the television screen, even though she knew they went by too fast, as did her life. i don’t want to die like that. un-lived. with regrets. alone. that’s my biggest fear - i don’t want to just survive, i want to live. i know we weren’t close, but if i  could go back, make more memories, give her company to make her feel less lonely, sit and have one more meaningless conversation about school, get one more pair of school tights for my birthday, hang her washing on the line whilst she sat on the bench under the sun reading her book, i would. just one last goodbye. one last thank you. just one last chance to say sorry — for not making an effort to remember more than just her silhouette.