Thyroid Storms

She started crying in the middle of rages— not the soft kind, but sharp, like she’d cut herself on something I couldn’t see. She slammed drawers. Shouted at a spoon. Broke a plate and sobbed as if the world had cracked with it. Before she left, my mother filled the kitchen with notes written on paper towels— taped to the cupboards, the countertops, the fridge. I couldn’t read, but I knew they were important— squares of paper whispering rules for someone to follow. And then she was gone. We went to see her in a hospital that smelled like bleach and stillness. She didn’t get up— just sat in a wheelchair with a white bandage wrapped around her throat like she’d tried to swallow something that wouldn’t go down. After that, she came home quiet. No more yelling. No more crying jags. She took down the notes, made my lunch and folded the laundry like nothing had happened— like maybe I dreamed it. I didn’t ask why, and she didn’t say. But I tried not to spill things. I tried not to be loud.