Finally, a whole week at the beach. The start to the year of 2015 had been a rough one, so we have been waiting for this vacation for months. North Carolina was just a “short” 24 hour drive. I couldn't wait for long, lazy days on the beach, soaking up the sun, and the ocean, so blue and welcoming. I had the luxury of spending it with my best friend while my sister brought two friends; there were a lot of kids. It was going to be paradise. We finally arrived at the beach house and found it had a view of the ocean that seemed to stretch for miles. On the afternoon of the second day we got a call from my grandma. She was in the hospital and we should come. Mom drove dad all the way to Norfolk, West Virginia that evening and he was off to Chicago to be by my grandma's side.

My dad sent us updates every day. They had to run a series of tests to figure out what exactly was wrong. It was hard to enjoy the beach while waiting for news. One day the news came: she had stage four cancer. Her body was quickly deteriorating, and we knew we didn't have long. My family and I thought we had a few weeks left with her, but one night she went into a vegetable state and wouldn't wake up. She went into some small corner of her brain one night and stayed there. She gave up. It's amazing what the brain is cable of, how much we control our body. In times where it's a matter of life or death, we can choose whether we live or die.

On our way back home we stopped in Chicago to visit her. The day we got there my mom left all the kids in the hotel room, and she went to visit my dad. She came back a few hours later, and sat my sister and me down and told us that grandma is gone and that she won't wake up. It felt like we were crying forever; all of us were huddled on one side of the hotel bed. This was the first time it felt real, like she was actually dying. The tears finally came to a close. My sister and I slept in my mom’s room that night, all of us in the same bed. I awoke the next day to find the bed empty. It was a beautiful Sunday morning, with  the sun was shining through the curtains of the dark hotel room. My mom came out of the bathroom and told us that grandma's body shut down. I didn't cry. I knew she wasn't going to come back, but my sister started crying again. My mom held her until she stopped, then we packed up our things and went home knowing that we would be back in a week for the funeral.

The funeral was small and peaceful. It was mostly family and really close friends. There was an open casket, but I couldn't look. I saw part of my grandma's face from a distance; it is an image that I don't think I will ever forget. People say the dead look like they're sleeping or they look peaceful, but I don’t agree. There is something about them that doesn't look right as they lay there motionless with almost an empty look, like something's missing. Few tears were shed as I said my final goodbye, but I kept in mind that she is probably happier wherever she is now than she ever was on Earth.

I did a lot of thinking after she died. There are so many unanswered questions. Where do we go when we die? After we die do we see the loved ones who have also passed? I thought about religion, and if there is only one right path. But maybe all religions have some truth to them. If not, which one do I follow to guarantee me a safe afterlife? I thought about what it was like to die, and if there is an afterlife, what it might look like and where it is. I thought about it so much that it eventually drove me crazy. I became irritated and frustrated because I didn't know the answers or how to find them. I can only wait to find these answers out on my own.

I'm angry with her. How could someone who was supposed to love my family keep a secret like this? She was never going to tell us, but someone made her call my family. We learned that she was diagnosed six months ago. I never got the chance to say goodbye. She took that away from my family, from my dad. If anyone deserved to know more, it was him. He deserved that chance because not many people are offered a chance. He stood by her through everything, and he was patient. Sometimes I remind myself that maybe she didn't want us to worry about her, or that she didn't want us to make a fuss about her. When I think of these possibilities I'm not angry anymore. Her decision doesn't seem so selfish. I’ve never grieved for a person who died. I don’t know how to feel. People make grieving out to be so overwhelming, but I feel nothing. Sometimes I get angry, but I remind myself that her motives weren’t to be selfish. Sometimes I’m sad, but I remember that she is happier in her afterlife than she was here, and it makes me feel better.

Writing this story is hard. I don’t know how to feel. For months, I have been repressing this event because I don’t want to deal with it. I don’t want to feel grief, anger, or betrayal. I never think about it because, if I do, I feel like I won’t be able to stop feeling these things. Sometimes I start to let it in, but then I push them back down, deep inside my head. It almost doesn’t seem real anymore, almost like she was never really there. My family and I talk about her, but it doesn’t feel like she was an actual person. All of these feelings are really confusing, and I can’t understand them. It gets really frustrating when your emotions are like a roller coaster that goes up, down, and all around. Writing this story is hard because I don’t like sharing how I feel. Instead, I keep it locked up, and nobody really knows how I feel about things. It’s a big step for me to write this story and share it with other people.

I do believe that one day all of the feelings, all the grief I’m suppose to feel will come out in some way, shape, or form. To be honest, I’m scared about how it will come out, what I will feel, and if it will create problems for me. But I also believe that one day I won’t feel so conflicted, and I’ll understand everything and why it happened the way it did. I won’t be angry. Instead, I will smile and laugh at all of the fun times my grandma and I had, and everything will be alright.