Grief doesn't always scream.
Sometimes it whispers. Quietly. Repeatedly. Until your whole life sounds like it.
That's how it felt.
There was no dramatic heartbreak moment. No weeping in the rain, no playlist of sad songs on loop.
Just five months of me going through the motions.
Brushing my teeth, checking my phone.
Working, checking my phone.
Sleeping, checking my phone.
I deleted our chat three times. Re-downloaded it every time.
I told myself I was over it.
And then I'd see someone skating past in a grey hoodie and feel my stomach flip.
Every message notification made my heart skip.
Every time I wore that T-shirt I left at his place, the one he gave back folded, like I was an item being returned, I felt something ache under my ribs.
I kept going to the skate park.
Maybe out of habit.
Maybe because I hoped.
He didn't come.
And when he did, I avoided eye contact. He did too.
I didn't tell anyone this, not even Nia, but for a while, I thought I might be pregnant.
I never confirmed it. Never took a test.
It wasn't even that I had symptoms.
It was just this terrifying, irrational, loud thought that refused to leave me alone.
The late period.
The nausea could've been stress.
The weight gain could've been meds.
The way my body changed, or maybe it didn't, and I just imagined it.
I googled "cryptic pregnancy" more times than I searched for job openings.
I was scared.
Not just of being pregnant, but of having a child tied to a man who wouldn't even answer a message.
A man who made me feel lucky just to be tolerated.
Some days, I hated him.
Other days, I hated myself more, for still loving someone who disappeared without a goodbye.
I wrote letters to him that I never sent.
Typed out long paragraphs in my notes app, then deleted them.
Started praying again, but most times I only prayed about him.
Not about healing. Not about clarity. Not even about myself.
Just him.
It took me five months to realize the silence wasn't ending.
He wasn't going to explain himself.
He wasn't going to say sorry.
He wasn't even going to say my name again.
But maybe that was the point.The silence was the answer.It said everything his words never did.That I was never enough to stay for.That love, at least his kind, didn't come with clarity or care.And even though I still woke up some days wanting it all to be a dream,I knew I couldn't keep living in the pause between messages.I had to write the ending myself.
Still, there were mornings I'd open Instagram just to see if he'd posted something new.Nights I'd lie in bed rehearsing what I'd say if he ever came back."Where have you been?""Why did you leave like that?""Do you know what you did to me?"
But none of those questions ever made it past my lips.Because deep down, I already knew the answers.He didn't leave because I was difficult.He left because he could.
And I?I stayed because I still believed love was enough.That if I just waited a little longer, hoped a little harder, hurt a little quieter.He might come back different.He didn't.
The version of me that waited for him wasn't the same girl who first fell.She was quieter now.Softer in places that used to feel strong.And harder in places that used to be tender.
Maybe that's what grief does.It doesn't just break you.It reshapes you.