After Annie

by Anna Quindlen

“One need never be ashamed or afraid of grieving. Those who do not grieve cannot feel.”

Maybe grief was like homesickness, something that wasn’t just about a specific person, but about losing that feeling that you were where you belonged, even if where you belonged seemed as everyday as brushing your teeth.

It felt as though Annie, gone, had created a centrifugal force that was sending them all in other directions, to the edges of one another’s lives, away from the center.