When beheading with a guillotine was a public execution people used to bet on how many times the eyes would blink after the head was severed from the body. The person was no longer alive but their brain was still active causing the eyelids to twitch. Once it stopped the life would leave their eyes.

But what happens when someone is shot in the head? The brain goes flying everywhere. There’s nothing to fire off signals so the body doesn’t twitch, the eyes don’t blink, the life immediately leaves without a trace. There’s no last few moments of movement. It’s immediate. Permanent. Immutable.

It happens in the blink of an eye. One second they’re there and alive the next…

That image doesn’t go away. It’s burned into your eyelids. Every time you blink, every time you sleep, every time there’s a sudden loud noise- it always comes back to haunt you. There’s no escape.

That’s one of the hardest parts. Outside of the guilt. Knowing it should have been you. That you would do anything to have one more second with them and you would trade places in a heartbeat. That this outcome came from your own actions. You weren’t the one who pulled the trigger but you created a domino effect that lead to that moment. And you can never take it back.

You didn’t mean to. You’re so sorry. You’re so fucking sorry but you can’t turn back the clock.

You’ve held many things in your hands, and You’ve lost them all.

This is the latest in a long string of losses that weighs on your soul or what’s left of it. Each loss feels like it’s chipped away at your heart and it’s gotten to the point where it feels like it’s crumbled to dust and blown away in the wind.

You’ve tried so hard to keep it intact but it feels like you’re desperately trying to grasp at grains of sand in a storm. Each time you collect even a fraction it’s blown away and you’re left desperately grasping at the pieces as they pass through your fingers.

It feels broken beyond repair. The one thing keeping you going is a promise you made one night under the stars. A promise you made on a whim because you felt it would never come to pass but ended up being some of the last words that passed between you two.

You promised to never forget them. Even if you weren’t together you would each carry on the other’s memory. It was a silly promise made between two lonely kids that were afraid and uncertain. But now you aren’t together and memories are all you have.

You will never forget.