The Farming of Bones

by Edwidge Danticat

I thought perhaps he told me this to unnerve me. Many people who considered themselves clever found pleasure in frightening the household workers with marvelous tales of the outside world, a world they supposed we would never see for ourselves.

leaving us both to parent all our childhood dreams out of ourselves.

Working for others, you learn to be present and invisible at the same time, nearby when they needed you, far off when they didn’t, but still close enough in case they changed their minds.

I wanted to say most of those things that never comfort the person hearing them, but only the one saying them.

But some sorrows were simply too individual to share.

It was as close to disappearing as I could come.