Three Fragments

Prompt: An experience nobody knows about, my reaction and what others attributed it to.

Some days I can still see him. Lying--always lying there on that bed. He is still coughing but hardly though, because he doesn't have the energy to do it right. I had seen this in real life and now anywhere else I was, so long I remembered it. It was this leftover image of my grandpa that scared me. I never told anyone what made me sleep in someone else's bedroom until I was twelve. They could always get a good laugh over how old I was before I could sleep alone in my room. They thought I was afraid of the dark. I guess in truth, they were right.

I decided a long time ago I could deal with their laughing better than I could to explain. So I didn't. It made me feel better that people acknowledged it though, so my pain wasn't completely hidden and alone. It just wasn't fully understood and I liked that. I am a very private person.

 I had seen him pass away simply because I had to go with my mom to visit her dad in the middle of the night. He was frail, the workers had said. He could pass at anytime and they just wanted us to say goodbye if the time were to be soon. So we went and he died while I stood there. Strange how as soon as the spirit leaves, the body becomes foreign. I didn't know him. It frightened me.

That's the real story behind why I couldn't sleep alone until I was twelve. Now it has just become natural to me, when everyone else is laughing and remembering, I remember him.