When We Believed in Mermaids

by Barbara O'Neal

Anyone who has lost somebody they love has experienced it—the head in the crowd on a busy street, the person at the grocery store who moves just like her. The rush to catch up, so relieved that she is actually still alive . . . Only to be crushed when the imposter turns around and the face is wrong. The eyes. The lips.

This is why we have funerals. We desperately need to see the truth for ourselves, see that loved one’s face, even if it’s marred. Otherwise, it’s just too hard to believe.

Unlike the earthquakes that remind us, over and over, that they can do whatever they want.

I don’t even think for a moment to consider this might be dangerous. That I might—that I have let down all my guards. I just kiss him. In the rain. On a ferry halfway around the world. Kiss him, and kiss him, and kiss him.

I think of my admission that I haven’t had much happiness, and it suddenly seems ridiculous. What am I waiting for?

Maybe for once in my life I might like to get a glimmering of what that feels like.

But it’s not about comparison, as my counselor used to say. My pain is my pain.

“Your quest is powerful. You needn’t apologize for the space it takes.”