I did not learn that my relationship was ending through a confession or a serious conversation about feelings. I learned the truth through a careless joke, the kind of lazy laughter filled remark that reveals exactly what someone thinks of you when they believe you will never hear it.
Last Thursday I returned home early from my shift at Riverview Regional Hospital in Chicago, Illinois, where I work as a radiology technician who spends every day around other people’s emergencies and private fears. A teenager with a fractured wrist tries not to cry while his mother holds his shoulder. An older man stares at the ceiling while waiting for a scan that might change the direction of his entire life. A parent grips a child’s hand until their knuckles turn white because fear does that to people.
By the time my shift normally ends I feel exhausted in a way that sleep rarely fixes, yet that particular afternoon I felt strangely energetic because it was the beginning of my boyfriend’s birthday week and he treated birthdays the way some people treat religious holidays.