I was so afraid he was going to say something about how he’d have to sit out on the helping this year because he might accidentally chop off his hand or put sugar in something when it was supposed to be salt or how we better make most of this Thanksgiving because we don’t know how many he’ll have left, or some other casual-sounding but actually really sad comment. That would be so like my dad, to make a joke of his disease, to pretend like it’s no big deal while simultaneously trying to be honest with me about something that was hard.

But none of that came. Instead, he just nodded and said, “Good, good, as long as you’ve got your pecan pumpkin pie in there, that’s my only request,” before turning and leaving the kitchen.

I wanted him to ask for more, for me to get a chance to get words around the lump that forms in my throat every time I see him now. I wanted the chance to tell him that I wasn’t ignoring him, that the reason I nodded and hummed instead of saying actual words was that it’s just so hard to speak the moment I hear his voice.

I know it’s unfair, but I need him to be the brave one. Because I don’t think I have it in me.

community/TheUnusuals post by n/thatsahumanperson

I always knew on some level how strange and scary it must be for people when I—or anyone else—reads their thoughts, but I have a better appreciation now for the emotional toll of being on the other side of that dynamic.

My sister has walked into my dreams a few times, but it’s always been pretty innocuous. That is, the dreams that she’s seen and the interactions we’ve had have been pretty innocuous—mostly just boring anxiety dreams or brief conversations where we just remark on how strange it is that we can both exist in my subconscious and have a conversation.

That’s the piece of this that we haven’t totally figured out—I remember the conversations we have in my dreams. I’ve asked my parents if they remember Rose appearing in their dreams—well, I asked my mom anyway. I don’t want to put pressure on my dad about anything, especially something like his dreams, which most perfectly healthy people don’t remember anyway. But my mom said that she doesn’t have any recollection of Rose appearing in her dreams, that she assumed the dream that I had where Rose and I spoke—the dream that sent Rose to That Place—was the one time that Rose had gone dreamdiving in the house. And I guess it’s possible that Rose has only been walking in my dreams, but I find that extremely unlikely.