Whispers to July Fifth

never told anyone—

not my friends,

not my sister,

not the cashier at the store

who noticed the strange mix in my basket:

batteries, matches, soup, cat food,

and a survival guide

tucked beneath a novel I never read.

I never told them

how I counted down the days

from May to June,

and then June to July—

marking each square on my calendar

with a silent breath held

a little longer than the day before.

⸻

I didn’t pray.

Not in the way you’d think.

No hands clasped,

no whispered requests to a god.

But I watched the sky

with reverence,

as if it might blink back.

And in my own way,

I made an altar

out of possibility—

out of the fragile belief

that something was coming

to take the weight off me.

⸻

I wasn’t suicidal.

That’s the tricky part.

This wasn’t about death

as much as it was about

relief.

I didn’t want to die.

I wanted to stop feeling

like I was wasting

the time I didn’t know how to use.

⸻

You see, I used to dream big.

When I was ten,

I told my mom I’d be an astronaut,

or a poet.

She laughed, said,

“You could be both.”

And I believed her.

For a while.

But dreams age like milk

when you let them sit

too long in the dark.

They sour.

They rot.

⸻

By twenty-nine,

I was making spreadsheets

and microwaving frozen dumplings

in a one-bedroom silence

that grew louder every year.

No medals.

No moon landings.

No poems.

Only a slow erosion

of the person I thought I’d be.

⸻

Then came the prophecy.

A whisper across the internet,

growing louder each time I clicked:

July 5th.

The date repeated like a mantra.

Something inside me stirred.

Not belief, exactly.

More like a reckless dare.

A desperate “what if.”

⸻

I told no one,

but I started to prepare.

Little things.

Not out of panic—

but preparation.

As if I’d been waiting

for permission

to stop pretending

everything was fine.

⸻

And when July fifth arrived—

the sky didn’t burn.

The sea didn’t rise.

My building didn’t shake.

No voice thundered from the heavens.

Just the low hum of city buses.

Just birds.

Just the neighbor’s dog barking

at nothing again.

⸻

I stood on the balcony,

watching a world

that had refused to end

for my sake.

And I cried.

Not out of fear.

Not even from disappointment.

But because I realized

the world had kept going

without me

for a long, long time.

⸻

And maybe…

maybe the shame

wasn’t in hoping for an end.

Maybe it was in

letting myself drift

so far from the beginning

that I mistook silence

for safety.

⸻

So I write this now,

not as a warning

or a testimony,

but as a reckoning.

For the hours I wasted

scrolling for answers

instead of asking real questions.

For the mornings I stayed in bed

waiting for proof

that effort was still worth it.

For the part of me

that wanted to be swallowed

just to feel something bigger

than disappointment.

⸻

And you—if you’re reading this,

maybe you’ve felt it too.

That quiet wish

to vanish under something

louder than your thoughts.

If you have,

you’re not broken.

You’re just tired.

And tiredness is not a prophecy.

It’s a pause.

⸻

The world didn’t end.

But I began again.

On July sixth,

I got out of bed

and made a list:

Call mom.

Feed the cat.

Write something

that isn’t an excuse.

And today,

I’m here.

Still writing.

Still not perfect.

Still sometimes afraid.

But no longer waiting

for the sky to fall

so I can feel lifted.