Grief is My Best Friend
by Destiny Moreno
University of the Incarnate Word
Destiny Moreno is a freshman at the University of Incarnate Word majoring in Psychology. One thing her major has taught her is the brain at this age is not fully developed but can be understood in relatable readings.
Today, I was okay, I smiled at your pictures and spoke to the air as if you were here. Shortly after, I got a knock on my door; it was my dear friend grief. It jumps down my throat, forcing its way down, and when I try to spit it up, all that comes out is, “Cancer took you away, and I’m sad,” and back down goes grief. I not only sleep to the memory of you, but grief tucks me in and sits on me with the weight of guilt on its lap. The smell of your perfume lingers around my skin, and my eyes begin to flood with sorrow. Grief makes a joke, and I swear I hear your laugh echo through the hollow air that surrounds me. Grief is my biggest enemy for sneaking up on me with hatred, but my bestest friend when I need to feel a hug that feels like you. I can't miss you, but I have not forgotten you. Grief gives me the cliché “God needed her home”, and I argue back with, “And where did God want me when she was home to me?” Inside these 4 white walls, I still think you are here, and I am reminded you now live in a jar on the table next to me. I cannot hug it or get a response from it. Cancer took my grandmother and replaced her with an embodiment of grief. I go through my days talking about you as if you were still here, but in the back of my mind, grief whispers to me that you are not coming back. Grief does not know its place; it does not know that it can’t cling on me like a blanket and drag me down. I know grief never goes away, although I wish it would have vanished; it accompanies events you should have been here for. You should have been here, but I am welcomed by someone I do not know, and they refer to themselves as grief. Within the months you have laid to rest, grief and I have become friends, the best of friends. We are forever, even when I beg it to set me free.
