How do you celebrate the birthday of someone who isn't getting older? Someone whose life was stopped before it really even started?

How do you post on Facebook letting people know that you would have turned 18 this year, but instead, you are forever stuck at 16?

I could still post on Facebook. But all I would get in response would be comments of sentimentality instead of celebration.

I could go buy your favorite, apple pie (because you didn't ever like birthday cake), and stick a candle in it. But that would feel empty because you are not there to blow out the candle and share a slice with me.

You would be a senior this year. I would take your senior photos, we would have a great day goofing off with an expensive camera that you never got to meet. You would probably make fun of me for spending that much on a camera because that's just what little brothers do.

Would you still be doing theater? Maybe you finally would have been cast in a large role. You would have done great and I would have come to see it as often as I could. You loved the people there. And the people there loved you. It was a good second home for you.

Would you have come to study at Morris with me? You would have thrived here. It is a place for nerds and you were a nerd if I ever saw one. I say this in the most loving, sisterly way possible. But I imagine that that smart head of yours would have allowed you so many larger opportunities than this small school on the prairie. But I secretly think you would have come here anyway.

I see your friends when I go home sometimes. They are all doing well, but they miss you. We will never stop missing you. There will forever be a part of life just gone forever.

When I go home, sometimes I forget that you are not there. You aren't going to come bounding up the stairs five minutes after mom calls us for dinner. You aren't downstairs creating some new contraption that our little brothers will destroy the second you turn your back.

I still can't go into your room. Correction: your old room. I don't know if I will ever be able to again.

You were a light in people's lives. Your smile could illuminate rooms in seconds. You always knew the right joke to make in any given situation. How could someone with so much joy towards other people be battling some of the largest demons I have ever seen anyone fight?

The last time I got to tell you "Happy Birthday," you said it right back to me. Because that is just how you lived. And now I will never forget it.

How do you spend year after year asking these same questions? Because I don't know if I will be able to do it.

I miss you Marky. Happy Birthday.