Another night. Eyes squeezed shut, feigning sleep. The familiar creak of the doorknob, a melody in the silence. Soft footsteps, the whisper of fabric against wood, then a gentle tug on the bedsheet.
“Goodnight, honey. Sleep well,” Mom’s voice, a lullaby etched into my memory.
Every night, after I pretended to drift off, she would come to wish me goodnight and put me to sleep.
Ten years. Every night after I feigned to drift off, she would appear. A ritual unbroken, even after the cemetery became her final resting place!
This morning, kneeling by her headstone, I whispered, “It’s been a decade, Mom. I’m grown up now. You needn’t come to wish me goodnight and put me to sleep any more.”
Ten o’clock. Time for bed. I become anxious as a strange emptiness settles in my chest. “Maybe… maybe just one more goodnight wouldn’t be a bad idea,” I console myself.
