The World Keeps Spinning and I Hate it for That

Work is so hectic that sometimes I forget to miss her. I forget the hours spent in the hospital, grasping a hand that slowly failed to grasp mine in return. My mother’s grave lies in a different state, barricading the memories behind state lines. In the midst of spreadsheets and calls from clients who forgot their online banking passwords, emotions get folded between the hours of the day, and exhaustion pushes grieving to the back burner.

On those days, I feel so numb that I wonder if I truly feel anything at all. My apartment feels just as it always did, too small with a perpetual leftover ramen smell in the air. The sounds of the city are just as loud as they always were. Everything looks the same as it did six months ago. But when I go for my shower, the only place my phone can’t numb my brain, I feel my chest begin to split open.

The days are monotonous, as I wait until the dead of night to let my emotions swallow me. There’s so much to be done, so much she wanted to see me do. Between my job, the attempt to make myself actual meals, and the paints I have to force myself to touch, time always seems to be running out. That life has returned to a sense of normalcy feels like its own insult.

I feel as though I’ve missed the opportunity to grieve properly. After a blink, a month has passed. People still call me, asking me about how well I’m taking care of myself. Reassurances pour out of a mouth that speaks without my say. My colleagues look at me with pity, but we didn’t have much of a relationship before, and we don’t form one now. Distantly, I am aware that I must look terrible. Remnants of insomnia cling to my eyes, and in spite of my cooking attempts, food feels like ash on my tongue. The woman I was, who used to come to work with a face of makeup, bright-eyed and enthusiastic, has become nothing but a ghost. A horribly irony.

I pass by flower shops on my way home from work, but I can’t bring myself to linger as I once would have. How many orchids did I leave by her bedside? As I continue to walk, the sky darkens with clouds threatening to burst. I almost feel relieved. Rain always helps me sleep and these days sunlight feels wrong, but then the skies open up. The fast walkers of the city immediately turn into the rats we cohabitate alongside. They scurry and sprint into corners, underneath ledges, towards anything with shelter. A smile almost reaches my cheeks as I sprint for my own apartment, only minutes away. A sense of urgency overtakes my bones as I run faster, feeling human beside the others swearing beside me. The camaraderie of frustration feels freeing.

I’m nearly laughing alongside a teenager with an absolutely filthy vocabulary when I duck into my stairwell. I pull out my phone to check the weather app, but it appears the meteorologists have no idea about the current rainstorm yet. As I swipe away from the app, rolling my eyes at its sunny skies prediction, I reach for the phone icon. Mom always has such contempt for the weathermen and their inability to get anything right. She says that if they don’t know, they should just write that instead of guessing and ruining everyone’s day.

My heart stops as my finger hovers over her name on the call list. The playful mood from minutes ago shatters around me as my body jerks in the remembrance that I can’t click her name. Mom can’t answer my call. I won’t get to hear her complaining about the weathermen again. I won’t even get to hear her voice again.

My fingers tremble as I slide my phone back into my pocket and trudge up the stairs. I tell myself it’s from the cold that I start to shake, but I know it’s not. My chest feels like it’s ripping open. It takes me three tries to open my door as my vision is overcome with tears.

I can’t believe I forgot she’s gone, that my brain still thinks of her in the present tense when everytime I close my eyes, I see her face turning gray. I can still feel her hand growing cold in mine. My knees hit the ground as the door shuts behind me. I don’t feel the hit. I can’t feel anything but her absence.

My face is in my hands as sobs wrack my body. How can she not be here? How can someone so full of light just be gone? Where has that light gone? My stupid uncle said that he felt her in the room after she had passed. I lied and said I did too, but I felt nothing, just as I feel nothing now. Why can’t I feel her?

Sometimes it feels like she’s been gone forever, like I might have dreamt her. Now, it feels like she was ripped from me just moments ago. Everyone told me losing a parent is like a giant hole opening up in your life, and though it may never go away, it will get smaller. But there is no hole. There’s only nothing. Nothing where there used to be everything. The world has no color anymore. Light is dimmer.

And I don’t want it to get better because why should the world go on when she’s not here.

I kneel on the floor knowing that eventually my legs will find their way to the bed, and I will continue on, but I don’t understand how I will. What is grief, but unexpressed love they say. So I drown in mine.