Between Bruises & Blooms

There was a Christmas

when every message
felt like choosing
between people I loved.

I thought
I was protecting
the ones who depended on me.

You thought
you were trying
to save your brother’s life.

Maybe

we were both right.

Maybe

we were both wrong.

I have read
those messages again—

the ones where
you begged me
to be careful,

the ones where
I drew lines
I didn’t know
how else to draw.

I hear something now

I couldn’t hear then.

Not anger.

Not accusation.

Just a sister
terrified
of losing her brother.

And I wonder
if you ever heard
what was underneath
my words.

Not judgment.

Not revenge.

Just a mother
terrified
of failing her daughters.

Fear has a way
of making us speak
like soldiers

when all we really are

is family.

I’m sorry

for every sentence
that made you feel
alone.

I’m sorry
for every moment
where my hurt
kept me
from hearing yours.

I know
I cannot rewrite
that winter.

I cannot take back
the nights
either of us spent
crying over messages
instead of talking
to each other.

But I can tell you
what should have been said
from the beginning.

I never stopped
loving you.

Not in the arguments.

Not in the silence.

Not after
you walked away.

If there is one thing
I wish we had both known,

it is this—

sometimes love
doesn’t disappear.

Sometimes

it just gets buried

under fear,

under grief,

under a December
neither of us
was ever meant
to survive alone.