RickThe nightmares stopped after I found out about my mother.Not because I was healing. Because I was too exhausted to dream. I would lie down at midnight, stare at the ceiling for an hour, then wake up at 5 AM with no memory of falling asleep. Just emptiness. Just the watch on my wrist. Time passing.Sarah came over again on a Sunday.She brought photos. Albums. Loose pictures in a cardboard box. We sat on my living room floor and spread them across the carpet."Here," she said, handing me a photo. "This is your mother at eighteen. The day she graduated high school."I looked at the girl in the photo. She was beautiful. Blonde hair. Big smile. My eyes. She had my eyes."She looks happy," I said."She was happy. Before everything.""Before my father."Sarah looked at me."Before she got sick," she said. "Your father was not the problem. He was just... there. She loved him. In her own way. But she was always going to leave. She was always going to run.""Then why did she marry him."
Last Updated : 2026-04-23 Read more