We were at my boyfriend’s mother’s birthday party. It was the kind of gathering where the table is full, laughter spills over, and you try to keep your face soft, even when something inside begins to tighten.
One of her dance friends started talking about his 12-year-old daughter. Just casually, during conversation. He spoke with a kind of calm certainty, as if loving a child gently was the most natural thing in the world. I nodded at first, smiled politely. But something in me broke when his words actually sank in.
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I stepped away and smoked by the window, trying to pull myself back into the moment. I watched the street, tried to focus on movement, on air, on anything. But I felt like I was drifting out of frame. Later, I went into the bathroom and cried. That deep, quiet kind of crying that feels like the body speaking on your behalf. I thought it would help. It didn’t. Despite all my instincts to stay composed, to keep smiling, to tune in to everyone else’s needs, I couldn’t recover.
It’s not that I’ve never known love like that. It’s that I did.
I had a father who would have spoken about me the same way. Gently. Proudly. Without fear or hesitation. There have been so many moments in my life where I’ve thought, I wish I could tell him this.
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When he died, I wasn’t the version of myself I am now. I was bitter. Worn out. I’d come home from the university feeling like I had aged years in a day. I’d retreat to my room to nap shortly and study more. I was exhausted by everything.
I had just started to soften again. Then he was gone.
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So now, when I think of him, I grieve the person I am becoming, the one who might’ve laughed with him again. The one who might’ve told him everything. The one who might’ve heard him say he was proud. But I’ll never get to see his kind eyes again. He is gone.
When that man spoke, I didn’t just feel envy, I felt immense grief. I recognized what was being described. And the sharp, unbearable absence of it reflected upon me like stage lights. The rest of the night blurred past. I couldn’t really hear what was said around me. I couldn’t stay rooted in my body. I just moved through it, hollowed out.
And now, I’m going to bed with all of it still sitting inside me.
Safety feels distant. There was an earthquake today. Maybe that contributed too.
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