My sister’s words bounce off the walls of the now empty room where a family used to reside like a hollowed out cavern absent of love and life. Dead.

Each time a family member walks up, seeking to reconnect I turn the light on, open the space, and ready it up with hope and the potential of renewal, eager to see if they will stay.

I am not sure what it is they are expecting here, what preconceived ideas fill their heads, but when they see my place is filled with me, they leave.

I am uncertain what they hope to find, what part of them they think I hold, but all I have to offer them is me. Isn’t that a line in a country western song?

In the past I had a magic family room, I could turn you into the best sister by not looking or hearing or watching your actions, I could delete and erase parts of you that were unkind; now the magic mirror is gone.

It must be shocking to feel the absence of magic, the void where pretend use to lie and instead of the delusional mirror; there is the reflection of you.

I know for it is just as shocking to me too.

You enter alone; you fill the space, only you. No smoke and mirrors to trick me into seeing a loving sister where there stands one ‘not that interested’.

I love that inside of me there is no trickery, no false ideals, no pretend place, but instead reality is shone even brighter.

My voice is able to speak what I need to say, to ask what I need to know, and I have the inner fortitude to witness your answer and to withstand the disappointment as I shut the light and close the door.
There was nothing inside me you were interested in.
I have nothing to make you stay.