stories I'll never write

five.

It's the middle of the night and I lay curled up in your bed. With the sheets wrapped close, and my face deep into the pillows.
I let the scent of you grab onto my skin and I refuse to get up. If I leave it may not smell like you next time I come back.
So I grasp the sheets tighter, and breath in just a little bit deeper. I refuse to let the dam from behind my eyes burst, in fear of getting your sheets wet.
I remember the nights we spent curled up here watching movies, and the mornings we spent talking of the unknown. I remember helping you pick out these sheets two years ago.
Now I'm grasping them as if my life depended on it and it just might. Because if I loose that last bit of you, I don't think I could actually breathe.
By morning your scent barely lingers and I hold on to that last bit left. Until it disappears just like the rest, and I'm left to wallow in my own scent. I'm left to finally let the tears come out, and let my heart break.
You're gone.
You're finally gone.
I barely whisper through the sobs "I love you mom" before I let go of your tangled sheets and stand.
She's gone.