I woke up to the image of your smile, head laying on the pillow next to mine, teeth unbrushed and hair spilling in curls across the bed. I reached out to pick a piece of hair out your eyes, stroking the cold mattress.
My sleep-blurred brain reminded me that you weren’t there, and my hand stopped dead.
Your pillow doesn’t even remember the shape of your head. There’s an echo of a scent, a faint memory clinging to unwashed cotton: apple shampoo, and warm curls, and laughter on a Sunday morning. I don’t want to remember, I can’t let myself forget, so I cling to each snapshot like holding onto red-hot pokers. Your smile burns my hands and your eyes weld my skin into scars that are never going to heal. My fingers ache from the struggle of holding on.
It was one of those days where you’re better off not leaving your bed, because the walls are caving in and your only protection from the empty ocean below is using your empty mattress as a raft. King size is too big for one broken person. I forced a leg over the side. I needed a minute. A minute turned into ten, staring at a beige wall and a smashed vase, before I dragged myself from the crushing safety of our- of my – bed.
I faintly remember you making me promise to eat once you’d gone. I made a million promises that day, sitting by your bedside with tears clogging my brain, and a stony grip on a hand that was cooling by the second. They had to drag me away from you in the end. I watched as you died, as the drugs clouded your system and the cancer finally clawed at its prize.
I picked at the plain Weetabix in my bowl until it was inedible enough to be poured down the sink. It was the middle of the night; I could be forgiven for breaking my promise to eat breakfast.
As I watched soggy cereal dregs at the rim of the drain, something snapped inside me. I sunk to the ground, howling, cheeks wet and heart heavy with an ache that I wasn’t sure any amount of crying could ever heal. I ransacked the cupboards, threw a plate at the wall. The tap kept running, my eyes kept watering, and with each ounce of sadness scrambling to get out, numbness took its place. The smash of the ceramics at least gave me a jolt of something. A sickening sense of apathy hit me. I put down my hands in surrender, sitting on my kitchen tiles, surrounded by broken crockery.
That’s when I heard it.
Your laugh.
Something inside of me stirred at the noise. If I didn’t know better, if I didn’t know that I’d lost the capacity when you’d lost the battle, I might’ve even said it was love.
I approached the noise, edging through my house like I was the ghost. Pushed open the door, softly, so that the hallway light cast a yellow triangle over the tiny creature making the sound. I took a step in. Your laughter spilled from our daughter’s mouth. It wrapped around my wounds, not healing, but helping, and it was all I could do not to break down at the foot of the crib.
You’d left me lonely, not alone. I clung to the tiny starfish hand like a lifeline. The warmth in my chest flickered just enough to keep me alive.

#grief

A Story on Grief