Rooms are Always Empty

Your shoes are still by the door. I stepped around them this morning like stepping around a memory that doesn’t want to go. The hallway light flickers now. It didn’t used to. I thought maybe your voice would echo if I left the door open long enough, but the house only hums, like it’s trying to forget you ever lived here. I found your notebook. The pages were still warm, some with half a sentence, some with only one word. They looked like they were waiting for you to finish. They say grief is heavy. But I think it feels more like nothing. And nothing is the heaviest thing I’ve ever held.