Sometimes being strong is a disability. Or at least it can seem like one. It can make you feel cold and numb. Sometimes, it can steal away all the pain and leave you with the taste of dismay like ash in your mouth. Dismay for the comfort of not tearing yourself apart with grief like a good woman should. Is any of this even real? This veil of calm. Perhaps I’ve repeated myself into a banal postcard of grief. Perhaps I’ve come to terms with myself, your decision, your assumed place in the halls of eternity.

If I stop telling people, maybe I can keep you longer. But you’re gone. I sent you away and talked myself out of inviting you back several times in a day. The day. The last day. I failed you. Maybe this. Maybe that. Maybe nothing. Maybe 20 more minutes, or 20 more years. It’s all locked away in the inaccessible past. In a moment in time that only you were ever aware of. The secretest of all secrets.

Ten years ago I would have burned flesh and tasted salt for months on end. I would be shut in the dark surrounded by a cacophony of aching melodies. That would feel more appropriate. That would be proper.

Not these days. I’ve grown. I have responsibilities. I have a special room for my bleeding feelings. I bleed in, not out. The pool ebbs and spills when there is a lull. Not being obliterated seems like a badge of shame on my face. Is this really a strength or is it a mark of poor character. Am I just being an adult who is more comfortable being childish?

Can you please come over and tell me I’m OK? Can you please come back and make a scene like in the good old days? Can we have a chance to make friends again in a world where you got better? Can we  still time travel if you’re dead? Can we please go back home and I cry in your neck while you wrap me up and make everything be OK again?

PLEASE?