“The Easter Bunny”

I was careful when placing the note on the fridge for my older brother to look at. It was dated for tomorrow: Easter. Three years had already passed since that fateful day...

My name is Leah Joanne Grant. I was six-years-old when my older brother Jayme promised our mother to take me to the Easter Eggstravaganza in our little hometown of Leighton, Iowa. I remember the exact date: May 27, 2016, my time of death 17:30. We had gone to the local Easter egg hunt and was on our way back home when the accident happened. It was pouring rain like you wouldn’t believe, and my brother and I were crossing the intersection when my pink stuffed rabbit—a gift from Jayme—fell into the street. My brother kept going, with me pulling on his arm, but it wasn’t until we had crossed the street did I fight free of his hand and run back out to get the rabbit...

With the rabbit, now covered in mud, and now back into my arms; I had smiled at my brother and before I knew it, I was engulfed in darkness. I later watched Jayme cry, sobbing so hard—it was hard to tell the difference between the tears and the rain—while he held onto my now limp body. Saying that it was his fault. I tried to comfort him, but in the end he couldn’t hear me no matter what I did...

One year went by, then another. My brother still blaming himself every time Easter would come around. Funnily enough, he kept the rabbit, I guess, as a reminder of what had happened. I pitied him: it wasn’t his fault, but my own. I couldn’t tell him that either, which left me restless and unable to move on. If there was a place for me to go. So for now, I just stayed with my brother and watched as he moved on with life, or at least tried to.

For the past three years, I've spent everyday with Jayme. Waking up, eating, doing fun things, school, homework, sports, and sleeping. He doesn't see me of course, watching him as he goes about his routine. For the first year after my death he had to go to therapy and on Sundays he'd visit my burial place and leave me flowers, crying and apologizing for not protecting me. Two years after, he starts getting into trouble--specially with the neighbor kids. Every time he sees one of them, he'd get angry and blame them for making fun of me all those years ago, since I had a skin disease called Vitiligo...

It was during the third year of me watching over him, that he began to realize what he wanted to do in life: he wanted to become a doctor. Someone who helped kids, like me, learn to overcome the hardships of life and to believe in themselves.....So everyday, I’ve been putting Post-it notes on his refrigerator. Encouraging him to never give up on his dream. He still has my rabbit, but I can tell that he no longer blames himself for what happened.

Today’s note was a special one: a final farewell. Happy that he now longer blamed himself, I felt ready to move on. With a smile, I looked at the fridge once more: “Good-bye Jayme, Love: Cheetah.”

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