We didn’t meet in a therapist’s office or a support group, but between rows of stone and names we loved too much to forget. What began as a simple act of kindness—a ride, a question, a shared silence—became something softer: permission to keep loving the people we had lost without apologizing for the ache. His Sofia, my Daniel; two lives that ended, yet kept echoing in notes, voicemails, and memories that refused to fade.
Grief didn’t loosen its grip that night, but it changed. It felt less like drowning alone and more like learning to breathe underwater with someone beside you. I went home to the same empty house, the same recorded voice, but everything was different. Love hadn’t disappeared with the bodies we buried. It had only moved—into the spaces between strangers, guiding us home when we felt most lost.
