Delicate Meanings

losing myself

Cancer.

That's what the doctors diagnosed him with.
The disease that keeps spreading.
You can never really get rid of cancer, just slow it down.
But eventually it all catches up to you.
At those worst moment, when all is well again.
It hits you.
It brings your whole world crashing down.

I remember I wrote you a card on your birthday.
I even wrote in Spanish so you could read it yourself.
So I wrote in my circular rushed writing,

"Dear Dad,

I love you will all my heart. I miss seeing you happy and not in pain. I know it's your birthday but I'll make a wish. I wish for you to get better, I wish for you to be cured. I wish you for you to be the perfect dad I once had.

Love, Your Daughter who loves
you more than anything"

And with this, he read it out loud.
The last part coming out in choked sobs.
My dad never cried, even when he was in pain he never did.
Seeing my dad crying broke something within me.
It broke the one thing holding me together and keeping me strong.
So I laid there and cried with him.
I cried there and watched as my life slowly began falling apart.
He was my best friend, my other half.
He protected me. And now I am alone.
I no longer have that rock holding me down.
I lost my everything that day it all happened.
The worst part is hugging a lifeless body.
A cold, unresponsive body.
Waiting for them to wake up.
He looked like he was peacefully sleeping.

Stroke, they said it was. One wrong move.
That was all it took for him to take his last breath.

It all took place in my living room. The same one I've grown to resent. I resent it because maybe things could have been different.
In this very room,
The room I do my homework in.
The room I relax in.
This very room is where it all happened.
The day
I lost
Not only my dad
But
Myself.