After my sister died, I couldn’t help but think back to the conversations we had, as well as the ones I wish we had. I remembered a time when Savannah and I slept in the backyard. Even with the streetlights on, we could still observe the constellations above us.

“What happens when we die?” She asked.
“I don’t know.”
“What do you want your funeral to be like?”
“I don’t know.”
“When I die, I want you to tell them to make me dust like they did for grandma. And then go to the park, the one with the tall hill. Take my dust with you in your pocket so I can go to the park too.”

The day I picked up her ashes, I traveled to the park she talked about when we were children. It was troublesome to accept that she had died, and I was the one to figure out what to do next.

In many ways, the park was identical to the way I had remembered it. Our father would take us there when we would have a day off from school. He was courageous in our eyes. He wouldn’t hesitate to pick up an insect or serpent and show it off. It was his passion for adventure that shaped me and my sister.

Getting out of the car was the easy part, but the track uphill seemed much more daunting than it had when I was a child. After half an hour passed, I reached the top of the hill, and I placed her urn next on the ground. I sat down and watched the world below. Everything was still, except for the beat of my own heart and I broke down.

Crying didn’t make me feel much better, but I needed to get it out. I sat until I was ready, and then I turned to see a patch of flowers lining the path back to the bottom of the hill that I hadn’t noticed before. Red tulips guided me to the park entrance.

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Devan Herron