She finally had him

Evan sat in the corner like the toys he no longer wanted to play with when he was a child, as the sunray was passing through Luna's White fur and hitting the pieces of broken porcelain box scattered across the floor.

The thing Evan wanted to keep safe the most after his beloved wife’s death — her beautiful handmade jewelry box — was now nothing but broken porcelain pieces, shining like passionate river water at sunset. The beautiful emerald-colored box that had once been too mishandled and stubborn to be properly opened, was never going to close again.

Fixing his eyes on his cat, Luna, sleeping on the highest shelf where sunlight heats up the most, he could tell that the sleeping beauty did not care for the shiny box she had pushed down from her wooden throne — turning into glowing dust and shiny pieces on the floor.

It hadn’t taken much for that dusty box to end up broken on the ground after being placed on Luna’s favorite resting spot — the shelf right beneath the round window, the holder of autumn’s warm-looking sunset light. No wonder why this 'wooden throne' is her favorite place to nap on.

Looking at the window placed high on the wall, Evan’s face resembled that of a child who doesn’t realize how innocent their expression looks when their gentle little heart is broken — the kind of face they make when they don’t care about how they look; no thoughts, no fear of judgment, just pure emotions mixed with innocence, poured over their face.

The sunset that filtered through the dying leaves of the persimmon tree drew out the tears that had been held hostage by their owner, letting them drip down Evan’s cheeks, forming a misshapen smile of relief on his face that once was too guarded to even smile ever since his great loss. The relief he was yearning for was finally with him.

As his hand that held the piece of paper grew weaker, the last letter from his wife that he had found among the dust and broken porcelain gently opened its folds to the sunlight once more, filling the abandoned words within it with warmth. The words, finally found rest after being read by their intended recipient, glowed softly in the faint light.

" My dear Evan, there was nothing I wanted more than for that porcelain box you once hid and protected with great care in that drawer to be broken. Not only revealing this letter to you, but showing you a new path you should follow .

I know no one else would be reading this but you — no one else to keep and protect my belongings, no one else to treat my forgotten things like pure gems.

No one else to… care.

Out of all the letters I’ve left for you, this is the one I wanted you to find this way. Please, read this — my last letter, carefully. Not only are you the only person who will receive it, but also the only one who could truly understand and learn from it, giving it the proper meaning it needs.

I’d like to thank you once again for the final parts of my life — the parts that made me not regret living this long, the times when I finally found and had you.

I love and hate at the same time to think of how many things there were left for us to learn and understand from each other — things we never knew this whole time about life, until we found one another. But yet, I believe the time was the thing that made it all much sweeter and glorious to learn.

I might be the happiest angel where I am, not only for having learned from you, but also for having taught you many things the times I was here.

Although I didn't let you notice this when I was living my final days, your angel’s heart was very broken. It broke when she realized she couldn’t teach her boy the most important lesson of all; not to make grief your friend.

I was mad at myself more than I was mad at you when I found that shoebox you’d hidden in that “broken” drawer— the section you said was impossible to open. God knew how heartbroken I was when I saw those failed projects I had thrown away and asked you not to keep, the bent nails I hit so cowardly with the hammer, the leaf collection I discarded when it turned into a little Bug town — Almost every piece of thing I had forgotten I owned or touched was in my sight again — in that faded red shoebox. Kept away from their avoided fates.

My sweet boy, I don’t ever want you to throw away any of those things. Not only is it too late for me to ask for it now — I truly want you to keep them and feel me with you. I want you to keep me alive. After all, you’re the only soul who ever cared to keep me alive

I am with you, Evan, closer than you could ever imagine. But it’s not only with those cold sheets of mine you refuse to change, nor with the lonely strands of hair you keep on my hairbrush, nor with any other remains of me. It’s the piece of mind I’ve left within you — the part that will always worry, always linger. And even though I'm sure you will, I still want to hope that you’ll give that piece of mind back to me very soon.

My worries come from imagining what “keeping me alive” might mean to you. Especially knowing the heart of my boy Evan , that meaning for "keeping me alive" might be very different from what I want it to be for you. If so, I’m afraid it might stop you from living — poison all the beautiful things you’ve gained from life, ruin all this maturing you gained, and eventually, end you.

I want you to keep me alive, but not in the wrong way. Not if it's going to destroy you. To make it more clear;

Let the flowers we planted shrivel away if you’ll keep them pressed under heavy book pages instead of planting their seeds next spring.

Burn those birdhouses we made if you’ll let them collect dust near the fireplace, instead of hanging them for the birds to fill with soft feathers.

Let that snowball in the fridge — the one we kept from last winter — melt, if you won’t place it back into freshly fallen snow next winter like we always did, like we always were supposed to.

if you learned one thing from that old porcelain box that was supposed to be broken a very long time ago, is to never stop the life of your surroundings, so that they won't stop yours.

Hang those birdhouses filled with bird feed, Let the birds with frozen feathers warm themselves beneath their freshly polished roofs.

Plant those seeds when the next spring comes — let their flowers bloom even brighter than last year.

Let that snowball touch its newborn family landed from the sky this winter, and make a new one before the spring sun melts the old.

I want us to be alive the way we used to be — not trapped inside boxes, collecting dust on safe shelves and molding under white sheets in the basement, waiting endlessly for the moment that Grief promised us, the one that will never come.

My sweet baby boy, I want you to live. And for that, you must understand that you can't have Grief as your friend. No friend of it ever gets too far in this path— especially someone who wants to keep more than one soul alive.

I want you to have me. I really do. And for that, I want you to understand what you need to, from all this. if you want to have me, you must let me have You first, Alive and living

Your dear angel, Royala"

As the sunlight put on her warm marigold dress when she reached the cold lightbulb on the ceiling, the little princess woke from her fluffy dreams — not surprised to face the absence of those eyes in the corner, the ones that had bathed in sunshine and tears for quite a while.

Once Luna felt the flicker of the front door from the first floor, she fixed her marble-like eyes on the dead Persimmon tree across the garden.

Almost as if she already knew Evan was headed there when stepping outside — with the wooden birdhouses in his hands, excited to take their places on the tree. their fresh paint and polish eager to face the rain and snow, knowing they would soon hold and protect little feathery hearts beating inside them, full of life. For the first time in a long while, Evan seemed this excited and lively when stepping outside the house.

Was Luna really carrying the same foresight as her late mother, Royala, the one who’d left that porcelain box on the shelf to be pushed to its destiny?

She must’ve known more than we think she does, when she focused on Evan's unreached destiny to the dead tree, no?

Or maybe Luna’s warm little paws were simply excited to see the baby birds that had just learned to fly... probably the only explanation for those who don't see more than a speechless animal behind those green little eyes covered with white fur.

But if you ask me, I can tell you about one thing Luna knew for sure: Her mommy could finally rest in brief peace, knowing she had finally and actually had Evan back after a long time, ever since she was gone.