It’s a mercy you can’t feel this kind of grief. It is a luck. It is a blessing.

She blamed me. I was just a child. I should have been less so I wouldn't be chosen.

She hated me for protecting my siblings, for tearing us all apart to save them and save myself. For doing what she should have done as a mother.

For not dying. For living when others have died.

And still… I forgave her.

But the ache never leaves. It is here.

I forgive or I don't.

At least she got her peace.

How do I sit beside the dying body of someone who let me be fed to monsters,
and then said it was my fault? A mother who was my child. I didn't know any other way to love except loving her as a mother. An angry mother.

How do I reconcile that love with betrayal, care with the memory of cruelty.. With the constant reminders that I wasn't enough enough for her to fight for life.

I grieve her alone.

I grieve what I had to do.

I rage at her.

I ache for what should have been.

And somehow, I still stay. I only sit here like nothing can break me because I was already broken. And much of it I done it to myself fully aware. And maybe insane, but aware.