I Don't Know What To Tell You
It was November 13th.
Four months after my dad died. Four months of holding it together in the way you do when you are not ready to stop holding it together. Four months of performing fine because fine felt safer than the alternative.
That night, fine stopped working.
So I called my best friend.
He said he was busy.
I do not remember exactly what I said next. Something about whether grief works on a schedule. Whether I was supposed to book a slot. Whether I should put it all on hold until he had a spare hour to be present for me.
What I actually said was: "Should I put my grief on hold until you are ready to be present for me?"
He said: I don't know what to tell you.
And that was that.
Here is the part nobody expects.
He called me back the next day. Told me he was struggling too. Depressed. Not coping. Needed help.
So I found him a therapist. Made the appointment. Paid for it.
Because that is what you do, right? You show up for people. Even when they did not show up for you. Especially then, maybe, because you know what it feels like to need someone and find nobody there.
He went. He got better. He apologized. Many times, sincerely, looking me in the eye.
I forgave him. I meant it.
And then I told him something I also meant: this was the last time.
Not as a threat. Just as a fact. Some things can be forgiven and still never repeated. I knew that about myself. I told him clearly so he knew it too.
We stayed friends for three more years.
Holidays together. His family. Regular dinners. All the normal shapes of a close friendship.
But it never felt the same. Something had shifted and we both knew it even when we pretended we did not. You can rebuild a lot of things. You cannot rebuild the moment before someone showed you who they were.
I kept showing up anyway. I told myself people are complicated. I told myself I had made a promise to forgive and this is what forgiveness looks like in practice. Messy. Uncomfortable. Sometimes hollow.
Then everything fell apart again.
Not one thing. Everything. All at once. The kind of collapse that does not announce itself politely. The kind where you look around for solid ground and there is none.
He was not there.
Not busy this time. Just absent. And when I finally heard his explanation for why, I did not argue. Did not send a long message. Did not ask questions.
I just blocked him. Quietly. Completely.
That was over a year ago. He never tried to reach me.
I think about that sometimes. Not with anger. I moved past anger a long time ago. More with a kind of clarity that only comes when you finally stop arguing with reality.
He showed me who he was on November 13th. I chose not to believe it. That is on me.
The most dangerous person in your life is not someone who hates you.
It is the one who calls you a friend while letting you drown. Especially when you are the one who bought them the life jacket.
I do not say this with bitterness. I genuinely wish him well. I wish everyone well from a very safe distance.
But I will tell you what I know now that I did not know then.
When someone shows you who they are in your worst moment, believe them. Not because people cannot change. But because you deserve someone who does not need your worst moment to motivate them to try.
You are not too much. You are not too needy. You are not asking for too much when you ask someone who calls themselves your friend to pick up the phone.
You are just asking the wrong person.
rise · believe · fly 🪶
From the Ashes She is for the woman in the middle of it. Not after. If this found you today, you are exactly where you are supposed to be.