🕊️ The Characters: Papa

Beloveds,

he was a quiet man.

steady. present without performing presence. the kind of person who didn't need to fill a room to fill it — who just was there, and that was enough.

i call him Papa.

he was the kind of father who showed up without announcement, loved without explanation, and left without saying goodbye in a way i understood in time to receive it.

on March 14, 2019, Papa died in a hospital. i wasn't there. the night before, my sister had called. he'd been rushed in. i was exhausted. i told myself I'd go in the morning.

i didn't sleep well. something in me already knew.

when i got to the hospital the next morning and walked into that room — motionless, chest high from resuscitation, tubes down his throat — i fell to my knees. i grabbed his hand. squeezed it.

he didn't squeeze back.

what i've had to learn slowly — and painfully — is that his silence was never distance. it was his love language.

he didn't need words. he showed up. he was steady. he was there.

i inherited that from him — the stillness, the watching, the ability to sit in a room with someone without needing to fill it.

and in our last real conversation, i missed what he was telling me. he said he wasn't sure he could make it to the wedding. i thought he meant physically — his body was weakening. i didn't realize he was saying goodbye.

i hear it now.

one week after he died, i got married. i walked down that aisle with grief still raw, performing joy i didn't feel, keeping a timeline that no longer mattered.

sometimes i wonder if the marriage ever had a chance — or if i sealed something shut before i ever let myself feel it.

Papa — i see your face in Jabari's patience. i hear your silence in my own stillness. i carry you forward by refusing to abandon myself the way i abandoned you that night.

you said you weren't sure you could make it. you were saying goodbye. i didn't hear it.

but i hear you now.

the full story — the guilt, the grief that doesn't resolve, the moment i finally gave myself permission to carry his love instead of his loss — is in Book 5: I Didn't Make It In Time.

or if this is the post that makes you want to read all of it — the full collection is available as a bundle - Speak, Mamacita: Seven Stories of Unsilencing Trauma.

A portion of proceeds from the Speak, Mamacita series supports The Sanctuary Foundation, launching November 2027.

next week: 🧑‍🏫 The Teacher — the first person who taught me that silence was safer than truth.

Talk Soon,
Santana Chevel 🌹