The Missing

Missing someone is not an emotion. It's a location. It's the specific spot on the couch where they used to sit that your body avoids without being told. It's the grocery aisle where you still reach for the thing they liked before your hand remembers there's no one to bring it home to. It's 7:14 PM on a Tuesday— the exact time you used to call and say nothing important, which was the most important part of your day. Missing someone is a phantom limb. The nerve endings still fire. Your brain still sends the signal: look left, they should be there. And every time they're not, you lose them a little again. Not all at once. Not dramatically. Just a paper cut that never quite closes. I miss you in the mornings most. Before the day builds its defenses— the tasks, the noise, the busy performance of being fine. In the morning there is just the bed, the light, the quiet where your voice used to be. People say it gets easier. They're not wrong. But easier is not the same as over. Easier means the ache moves from the center of your chest to somewhere behind your ribs— still there, just more polite about it. I carry you like a song stuck in my head. I didn't choose it. I can't stop it. And some days I don't want to because the missing is the last thread between us and if I stop pulling, I'm afraid the whole thing unravels. So I miss you. On purpose. With everything I have. Because missing someone is just love with nowhere to go.