A Day of Mourning

The death of this author came as a shock to many.

But before we get to her death we must delve into her reason for writing.  

At nine-years-old she and her family attended a Mother’s Day party. Later that day, after all the guests had gone home, her mother received a call; the host’s son had gone missing. She, in her youth, thought the boy was just hiding, that he would just reappear unharmed..

He’d been missing for a heart wrenching week before they pulled his body out of the water. It was only speculation, because this was an age before doorbell cameras, but the police believed he wandered off and fell into the nearby creek. There were no signs of foul play, no suspicious activity around the house.

It was an unfortunate tragedy.

She, as young as she was, couldn’t understand it. She was naïve in her youth. How could someone so young just die? How could a life unlived get cut short?

The grief that ensued stuck with her. It was like the whole town was in morning.

Death was such a strange concept to her back then. She’d been rather sheltered and didn’t realize that bad things can sometimes happen to the innocent. To her, death happened to the elderly, to those who completed their lives.

She wasn’t at fault. Her family had left the event earlier, and the boy was still present, that she was sure of. So why did this have such a hold on her?

It was her first time seeing grief. The sort of grief that settles deep in your bones and live there for years, decades. She saw what it did to the adults around her. And for the kids, it was like a hole was left there, where this boy should have been growing up with them, who had never come back.

So yes, this event shook her.

It was unfair, unjust, unthinkable. She couldn’t solve this problem. She couldn’t make this better. As she grew up, whenever she’d see the child’s mother, even when she would smile, the pain and guilt would always be there, and there was nothing that would ever truly heal her. The pain of having to bury a child, especially one so young, was unimaginable.

And that was what got her into writing.

It began as a creative outlet, a place where she could have control.

Through writing her stories, the little boy didn’t drown. He survived, and made friends, fought monsters, lived in different worlds. In these stories his family didn’t have to mourn him. They watched him grow up and become a man they could be proud of.

Though most of those first stories will never see the light of day, it was healing. Writing was therapeutic for her.

This wasn’t the last unfortunate death she ever faced, but it was the one that stuck with her the most. Perhaps it was because she’d been so close to the family. She’d been there in the aftermath.

The family spent years trying to move on with this tragedy. They eventually created a scholarship in their son’s name.

The first ever book she wrote was dedicated to him, and she gave the parents a copy.

When we speak of her life as an author, we must give credence to the little boy who lives in every one of her stories.