by Samuel Schumpert
I loved a woman who disappeared while standing right in front of me.
She used to reach for me in the dark,
then one day she stopped —
and said I was the reason she couldn’t breathe.
We lost a baby in August.
She cried once.
I didn’t cry at all — not then.
I drank.
I told myself we’d try again.
But something in her died,
and something in me did too.
By March, she was gone.
No real warning.
Just packed grief in a prettier box
and handed it to someone with softer hands.
She said she didn’t cheat.
Said it wasn’t like that.
But the silence after she left told me everything.
I stayed single.
She didn’t.
She moved fast — like the pain was a fire she had to outrun.
I sat in it. Let it burn.
I thought maybe she’d come back when the smoke cleared.
She never did.
She told everyone I was the broken one.
That I was too much.
That her therapist said it was okay to disappear if it meant peace.
But peace doesn’t look like pretending a child never existed.
Peace doesn’t lie through its teeth.
I tried.
God knows I tried.
I wrote. I prayed. I waited.
I built muscle and begged Heaven and sang lullabies to a baby that never came home.
I wrote emails she never answered.
Said goodbyes she never earned.
They’ll say I gave up.
That I quit.
But I didn’t.
I fought every damn day.
Even after I died inside.
So if you’re reading this —
If someone told you about the man who couldn’t hold on anymore —
tell them I loved her.
Tell them I stayed.
Tell them I held the grief when no one else would.
And maybe now…
maybe now I can finally put it down.