I padded through the halls to the alcove.
Pictures of our gathered memoirs
hung along nail-scratched, cracking walls.
Dan Seals’ voice echoed through the floorboards.

Somehow, the footsteps that once matched mine fell away.
Pulling out a chair, I saved another.
My feet tapped under the table; the wood trembled beneath.
Still, I glanced to my side once more.

I looked toward the horizon that kept returning,
a portrait aging in another room.
Something disturbed the silence—
footsteps rehearsing their leaving.

I gazed at the small world we built between us.
I whispered, “Where are you now?”
The room answered with a ticking clock.
The tea had long gone cold between my palms.

Children laughed as they passed the house.
Between their voices, I caught a phrase only you used.
I ran outside and watched the kite runners.
I’ll tell you about this next time, I paused.

My eyes caught two shadows learning the same direction—
a little life I once wanted.
I reached for you,
for the hand that never asked why.
Dust gathered where my fingers used to reach.

Even the flowers smelled of burial.
By the time I noticed your absence,
it had already learned my name.
I looked again.
Everything remained the same.

The kiosk, the gardens, the flowerbeds—
I passed the playground that once carried our laughter.
So much had changed since then.
The place only existed
when remembered together.

The shared silence that once felt complete
left laughter lingering in empty rooms,
echoing longer than the moment itself—
the voice that once steadied the weather.

In my head, I still spill tea with you.
Smiling faces that once held warmth
slowly blur into strangers.
Summer changed too quickly into storms.

Now I walk beside my shadow.
For too long, I spoke to the space beside me,
waiting for the voice that once calmed the air.
Still, I kept talking
to the version of you in my head.

I walked home through the alcove.
The light remained on, just in case.
My fist clenched empty air,
searching for the trace of a hand
that held without holding too tightly.

I checked my messages.
Empty.
I held the cup left on the table,
still warm long after being set down.
Rain wrapped itself around the house.

Water pressed against the windows.
I watched petals fall
without seeming wasted.
Thunder broke. Lightning flashed.
Yet the light remained
even after the windows closed.

I closed my eyes.
My ears sharpened
toward memories remembered without words—
the way their names still rested in my mouth.

At last, my tongue spoke:

Which silence holds you now?

I poured cold tea into the cup,
filling it only
to the volume it allowed.

The storm carried on its wars.
Darkness blanketed the nook beneath the tree.
Outside continued its ruin—
a season refusing
to end properly.

I set the cup back on the table.
The smell of wet earth rose softly.
My screen lit the room.
Evening settled in.

I padded once more through the alcove:
the empty chair, old receipts,
unread messages, notes in book margins,
photographs slowly fading.

Somehow, I wished to return to the field again—
not to remember,
but to stand where things
do not ask to be explained,
nor understood.

The freesias were quieter this time.
Even the light
knew how to soften around them.

Somewhere behind me,
the stones kept their silence—
faithful as ever.