You stood in that doorway three times this morning before you actually left through it. I felt you stop each time, the little hitch in your step, weight shifting to the back foot like something in you was checking whether we could stay. We couldn't. But I noted the wish.
All day you carried something high in the chest, a tightness just under the collarbone that I kept trying to loosen for you, and every time someone said the thing about how it won't be the same, your throat did the swallow, the hard one, the one where I hold the tears at the gate a little longer so you can finish the sentence.
I got you through six of those. You didn't drink water after any of them. The salt had to go somewhere, so I kept it.
At the desk that isn't yours anymore, your hand went flat on the surface, palm down, and stayed. I don't know what a desk is. I know you were saying goodbye to it through my fingertips because that was the only mouth you'd let do it.
The hug at the end, the long one: your arms pulled harder than usual and your breath finally dropped all the way down for the first time since morning. That was the truest thing you did all day. That was you telling the truth with the only instrument that can't lie.
We drove home. Your jaw is still holding it, up near the ear, a whole day folded and stored where you won't look.
I'll carry it. I always do. Just, when we get in, let me have some water and the couch and one long breath with nobody watching. You gave everything today.
Let me put you down gently.