All of us died that day — but only one stopped breathing.
There are days when grief feels like an open wound, and others when it settles like dust — quiet, unnoticed, but always there. I used to think death was loud. A crashing halt. A world-ending moment. But now I know it’s quieter than that — so quiet, you don’t even realise when it happens.
It’s a phone call at 4 a.m.
It’s the sound of my father crying in the dark, gripping the wheel tighter as he drives through empty roads. It’s waking up to a world that looks the same, but feels emptier.
I lost my first grandfather before I even knew him. My mom’s father passed when I was just a few months old, and so, to me, he exists only in framed photographs and the softened voices of those who remember. Grief, I learned, cannot grow where memories do not exist.
But at thirteen, I learned what loss truly felt like.
My grandfather had always been strong, the kind of man who defied the years, and carried himself with quiet resilience. And then, suddenly, he was not. I remember how he still tried — tried to stand, tried to pray, tried to be the man he had always been. I remember my father by his side, holding on, hoping.
And then one night, when it seemed like the worst had passed, my father came home to rest. Just for a little while. Just until morning.
But grief does not wait for when we are ready.
At 4 a.m., the phone rang. My father gripped the steering wheel in silence as we drove through the dark, his hands tight on the wheel, his thoughts somewhere else. He did not say much, only that he should have stayed. That maybe things would have been different.
But I know now that loss does not bargain. It takes, regardless.
I was thirteen when I learned that people don’t just disappear. They linger.
In the way their old house still smells like them.
In the chair they used to sit in, left untouched for years.
In the closet you waited for them to find you again during hide-and-seek.
And sometimes, in dreams.
I see him sometimes. He never speaks, but he’s there. Doing things, smiling. Like he’s fine. Like he never left. And maybe that’s the strangest part — how someone can be so present, yet so absent all at once. Like they exist somewhere just outside of reach, close enough to feel, but never close enough to hold.
And sometimes, grief is for the ones we’ve never even met. The ones we only knew through songs, screens, and stories. The ones who felt like constants, a rock to you — until, suddenly, they weren’t. A voice you grew up listening to, singing along with. A presence that felt familiar, lighting up big Hollywood screens, even from miles away. And then one day, they are gone, and you are left mourning someone who never knew your name, but somehow still knew you. All the songs they sang, the books they wrote, the films they acted in — they became your comfort. Because grief, as greedy as it is, does not ask whether the love was personal. Only that it was real.
And grief is the greediest form of love — taking without asking, lingering without permission. Once you know its name, you start recognising it everywhere. Haven’t you noticed?
It is for the people who leave, even when they are still breathing.
It’s for friendships that fade into small talk.
For love that once felt permanent but unravelled into something unrecognisable.
We mourn the versions of people that no longer exist — the ones who knew us in ways no one else did.
It’s the old friend you drew comics with in second grade. It’s the one you make stupid prank calls with. The one you watched grow into someone you were so proud of — someone who survived things you’ll never fully understand — only to end up as mutuals who don’t talk anymore. Maybe a like on a post, or a story. Maybe not even a view.
It’s the friend from high school you once swore would be your maid of honour, only to realise one day that you won’t even remember to send them an invitation.
But more than that, grief is also for ourselves.
We outgrow places we once called home. We shed versions of ourselves that we swore would last forever. And one day, we look back and realise that the person we used to be — naïve, wide-eyed, unguarded, untouched by the weight of knowing better— is gone.
Sometimes, we are the ones who stop breathing.
Not in the literal sense, but in the way that parts of us die quietly, replaced by something new, something different. And just like any loss, it comes with mourning. But maybe, if we are lucky, it also comes with acceptance.
But always remember: morning comes after mourning.
And when it does, I hope you find yourself standing in the light.
Or be the light yourself, as you always are.
Just flick on that switch once you found it, alright?
Have faith, always.
