Small Worlds

by Caleb Azumah Nelson

‘What happens? Do you chat to each other?’ ‘We never needed to,’ he says. ‘Just needed to be beside each other.’

You take a moment to look at him then. He’s a little older now, not just in his face but in his spirit. You’re his youngest son and it feels like the gap between you grows wider every day. Sometimes, you see a sheen on his eyes like a glimmer, a sad glint, his attention elsewhere. You’ve never seen him cry, but in those moments he looks close. Whenever you go to ask what fragment has bled into his day, what is haunting him, he waves a hand, pushes any notion of closeness away. Despite this, you open your mouth to ask, ‘How could I forget you?’ when your mum walks in, all youth and glint and smile. She takes your face in her hands, and pulls you close, so you feel her heart thud a melancholy rhythm. ‘You know you can come back home whenever?’ ‘I know, Mum. I know.’

There have been other suggestions that perhaps you’re not wholly welcome in this country, but they’ve always been unspoken: you know, when they cross the road in broad daylight, or the stares you attract on the bus, the frequency with which you or T are pulled over, the jobs you apply for and never get. You thought – and maybe you’ve all thought this, but never said it aloud – that maybe it was just you, or that once you had enough money, the right job, the right accent, all those behaviours towards you would ease. You didn’t expect for it to become worse. You didn’t expect this kind of intrusion.

Maybe this is all we need sometimes, for someone else to believe in the possibilities you see for yourself.