For Every Missing Shade

Epilogue

It's been a while since I've opened up this diary. Just about one year, to be exact. I often think back to what crossed my mind in that car, that last night I wrote anything in here.

I started this diary in class. It was supposed to be a little hobby, a way to recount my day. Look at what it grew into.

It makes me think about divine plans and fate. It's as if the gods knew what I was about to experience and said, "Oh yeah, you're going to want to write this down."

They were right.

It wasn't until the first anniversary of her death that I opened up the letter she gave me. It was nice to have. Kind of funny, kind of deep, but mostly full of wonder.

Just like she was.

She talked about all the things she couldn't say the last time we talked. She told me about how much I changed her life, how much she loved me, and a bunch of other sappy stuff. She talked about my theory of color, the missing shades, time dilation, and her Something (with a capital S).

She wrote about the cards she was dealt and whether or not she resented anyone for them. Honestly, I was only a small part of the letter. Her life was bigger than me, which is something I've grown to really appreciate.

The hardships, the leaving, the mourning; they were all temporary feelings. They were emotions that would last her until the next morning, and me a year or two after.

But she didn't care about the temporary. She didn't care that it was hard for her or hard for me. All she wanted was for our time together to make the world a bit more colorful.

If not for her, then for everyone else.

By the way, I did get that scholarship. I got it that same spring after she passed. I submitted my Spectrum of Suffering to the board alongside a description of what it meant. I'm not sure if it was the picture itself or its story that made them give me the scholarship, but I have Emma to thank for either reason.

College is weird. There's nobody telling me to do anything. There's no seven hour days of school, no passing periods, no lockers, and no study hall. I've made new friends with people who like what I like and I'm happy about it.

It's nice that college is a time to reinvent yourself. The person I was for 90% of my high school career was not someone I wanted to bring to college with me. Emma helped me change. I realized that, in everyone, color was only a conversation away.

Everyone has their own story. Maybe someone tries to blend into the crowd because their parents were immigrants and blending in meant that they weren't treated like an outcast. Maybe someone doesn't like to take dangerous leaps because their life has changed too many times, and always for the worse.

Now I realize that. It just took me too long to understand.

I'm really trying to tie up as many loose ends here as I can. I just don't know what else to say. Stew goes to Missouri State and is majoring in exercise sciences, my mom and dad are both still happily married, and I now get to paint alongside some of the most brilliant professors I've ever met.

Emma's gravestone came in beautifully. It was a black granite stone with two wings that made benches. The top of the stone was made to act as a table so people could sit down and stay for a while. Enough room to talk with friends and share stories.

It was the type of thing that would make Emma happy to be a part of.

And, as I'm sure you've been wondering, I have not dated anyone else since. Not that I've been holding myself back to honor her memory or anything, but it's just been hard to find someone who can handle me the same way she did.

She's a tough one to compare people against, but it's all I got.

It was odd, driving off to college on the same interstate we drove to Colorado on. Even the feeling in my stomach was the same. It was a nervous excitement; a scared earnestness for the unknown ahead of me.

But, much like it was with her, it was now or never.