Aftercare

People come like seasons—

warm for a while, then gone without forwarding address.

They borrow our chairs, our time, our listening,

leave coffee rings on the table and call it memory.

Today my mother lay under a quiet lamp,

lasers combing the fog from her sight—

twenty minutes each eye, a small bright surgery,

a miracle measured by a clock.

Only my father waited in the hallway’s hush.

The phone should have rattled with love; it didn’t.

No “how is she?”

No “did it go okay?”

Silence: a bell that keeps not ringing.

And I’m here, oceans away in America,

counting the unmade calls like missed heartbeats,

thinking of everything I gave them—rides, replies,

late-night pep talks, pieces of my calendar—

and wondering why giving can feel like vanishing.

Maybe that’s the lesson I didn’t want:

some people are chapters, not the book.

They teach you how to hold on,

mostly so you learn where to let go.

Maa will see a little clearer tomorrow;

light will thread its way back into her days.

I’ll save my softest hours for the ones who show up,

for the man in the hallway, for the woman under the lamp,

for the child in me who needed a call.

The rest can pass like weather.

No bitterness—only boundaries.

If they return, they’ll find a smaller chair.

If they don’t, the room will be brighter anyway.

And when the phone is quiet, I’ll be the ringing—

I’ll be the aftercare I hoped to hear,

the steady hand on the shoulder,

the simple, holy question: are you okay?

- Aditya Dube