Philip Dampier's Blog

Episode 2

Hannah wondered if she looked like her mother. She knew she didn’t look like Billy and so one of them must look like their mother and one their father. She hoped she looked like her mother. She walked by the mirror on the kitchen door and studied her face. What would she look like if she were twenty years older? Did her mother have light brown hair like her? Did she have freckles on her face?

That night, holding Billy’s bear, Hannah looked up at the ceiling. Somewhere up there, far away, was her brother. Maybe he was with God. She wished she was with God too. No pain and crying. No shame like she felt now, and if the Sunday School teacher was right, there was real love in heaven. She wondered what that would be like. She closed her eyes and tried to imagine it.

Her lips began to move, and words came out of her mouth.

“God, if you are really up there, will you please love my brother? I loved him, and he loves me, but now we’re not together anymore.”

She was shocked. She had tried to pray but was never able to. She felt embolden and continued.

“Also God, could you send someone to love me. I’m very lonely now that Billy is gone.”

Hannah thought about what Mrs. Johnson had said about the wall and moving on. She couldn’t move on, that was the problem. Billy was all she had, and now the wall was all there was to remember him by beside the bear. She wasn’t ready to give the wall up yet. She knew she wouldn’t be able to go again until Sunday afternoon. It would have to do.