Recently, when the news broke that Brooke Wilberger's remains had finally been located, I saw a short video clip of Brooke's mother expressing gratitude - in part, to her daughter's killer for revealing to police where the body could be found. Even if he provided this information as part of his plea agreement to avoid the death penalty, it still meant Brooke could finally be returned to her family.
I remember this case well. Brooke went missing when I still lived in Oregon, so her photograph featured prominently on the newspaper front pages. That was five years ago - a long time to wait for a daughter's remains to receive a proper burial, to know the full story of her final moments, to have a setting in which to place them. I cannot imagine what it must have felt like to finally know where Brooke was - a relief, perhaps. While some reacted with shock that Brooke's mother could feel anything close to gratitude, I partly understand what she means - not because I can even begin to know her pain, but because I know what it means to want answers. To need answers, however horrifying or ugly, in order to bury remains.
This past weekend marked the one-year anniversary of my oldest brother's death, and well-meaning acquaintances and online friends reassure me that the hardest part is over now, that the one-year anniversary is the worst, that the questions will all diminish and fade, that I will never again grieve so hard, that I can heal now. But the shadows have not been lit, and the questions feel more urgent every day. I want my brother to lead me to the scene of the crime, so to speak, where it all went wrong, where it became possible to do what he was accused of doing, where something snapped. I need him to lead me there, to show me what happened, to admit to it, or explain it, or enter a plea.
Lately, I have been considering hypnosis. I want to dig up long-buried memories and yank them out by the root, so I can examine them more closely, ask questions that my family never thought to ask, find out for myself. I want to recover the memories I know I lost, to understand images such as: __________.
If I could have asked my brother while he was still alive, and if he would have answered, I would have felt gratitude. And even though he is no longer here to answer me, if something in my memories of him reveals the answers, I will feel it, too. I want to.
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