Standing on the Worn Doorstep of My Childhood Home as My Mother Returns After Years of Silence, Seeking Something I Cannot Name

But it doesn’t.

Being here doesn’t erase the years of absence.

It doesn’t fill the void she left behind.

“And?” I ask, my voice barely more than a whisper.

It’s all I can manage.

She hesitates, her mouth opening and then closing again.

There’s a pause, a moment where anything might have been said.

But she chooses silence.

And in that silence, I see everything.

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