Silent Thunder
One of the hardest struggles is to feel like nobody needs you. To lay awake at night, and to feel the absence of one of the most important people in your life. Trying to avoid the empty space to assure yourself that it’s not empty, convince yourself somebody’s there. Desperate thoughts circling around your skull like a distant buzzing you can’t escape from. A steady stream of tears carving a path down your cheek, and washing away your mask.
I’m not getting any sleep tonight. Tiptoeing down the hallway, I hesitate at my son’s room. Light escapes through the crack under his door, but not a sound can be heard. I can’t see him, but I know that his tears mirror my own. His pain is as uncontrollable as the light in the way that it seeps underneath his door. It’s hard not to dwell on the days when I knew how to comfort him, the days when all he feared was a simple thunderstorm.
The sounds of the clouds crashing overhead woke him. We were woken when he snuck into our room, shaking and crying quietly with fright. My husband’s reassuring words were no consolation to him. That night, nothing could have convinced him that he was safe. The lightning illuminated our room and the clouds angrily bellowed at us from the gray sky above. Nothing could distract him, the sky was at war and that’s all he could think about.
Now we stand on opposite sides of a wooden door, both of us wanting reassurance. Only separated by the turn of a doorknob. Wanting so intensely to be the one to close the gap between us, but knowing that I can’t. This time, I can’t be the one to comfort him. Every day he seems to become more independent. He hardly even needs me anymore. This time, I can’t be the one to decide for him, regardless of the pain it causes me.
Now, he falls asleep to the sound of silent thunder, that only he can hear. I know that he won’t reach out. He wants his independence, and I have to be strong enough to give it to him. When he was younger, I was the one who helped him through every scraped knee, every mean word, every stormy night. I’ve held his hand through everything, but we’ve reached a point where I have to let go. I wish I could still solve all of his problems, but there are some battles that need to be fought alone.