Almost

I can almost feel his feathery soft hair, almost smell his toddler sweat that beaded up around his hairline and the nape of his neck, almost feel his skinny little body in my arms, sometimes kicking and screaming and sometime snuggling, almost feel the wells of his dimples on my lips when I used to kiss them. Almost.
I can almost sense all those familiar ways I knew him, know him, like how I remember the velvet soft fur of my dog's ear when I was growing up. A couple dozen puzzle pieces are what I hold onto of the thousands that made him up.
It's not him, though. It's who he was. When he was here. Who he is is no more. He wouldn't have that same wispy baby hair if he was here now, at five years old. It would have grown coarser. He wouldn't have that same Mickey Mouse voice. He wouldn't still be carrying around Thomas the Train.
The sensory memories are the closest things I have to him. They are better than photos, or videos, or any of his things we kept. Because I can almost feel him. They are precious, but they are almost. He is light years away.