while the world keeps moving
I’m fifteen,
and I thought life was supposed to wait for me.
I thought grief was something that happened
to other people,
somewhere else.
But the phone rang one night,
and my mom said it like a secret—
your uncle… he’s sick.
and not the kind that gets better.
Pancreatic cancer.
Last stage.
No cure.
Just time—
like a candle they forgot to blow out.
Since then,
I haven’t really been here.
My body sits behind a school desk,
but my mind…
my mind’s somewhere between
a hospital room and last summer
when everything still felt normal.
The teacher writes numbers on the board,
and I try to care.
But all I see are countdowns.
All I hear is his laugh
echoing through the noise
of a world that doesn’t stop for anyone.
He still smiles when I visit.
Every week,
two hours.
He asks how school is.
I lie.
I say “it’s fine.”
Because what else do you say
to someone who’s running out of days?
And then I go home,
and I close the door,
and it’s like the air itself hurts.
Like I’m made of questions
that don’t have answers.
How long?
Why him?
Why now?
Everyone says “be strong.”
But they don’t tell you
how strength feels like breaking in silence.
How you can laugh in class
and still feel like you’re disappearing.
He’s dying.
And I’m here.
Fifteen years old,
behind a desk,
pretending that fractions matter
when someone I love
is fading like the end of a song.
And the bell rings.
Everyone runs.
And I just sit there,
because I can’t tell if it’s over for the day—
or if something much bigger
is about to end.
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