It had started as a sunny day but the further north we got it became mistier and greyer and I felt more at peace, though I had the kind of trepidation in my stomach when you know that you’re doing something monumental.

I glanced anxiously at my suitcase in the luggage rack, making sure it was still there. Making sure he was still there. We were finally taking dad back home.

Sometimes I think of grief like an old woollen jumper. It’s the knitwear you fold at the bottom of your drawer, only getting it out on the coldest of days or in the very midst of winter.  

Sometimes you only wear it on Christmas day, or on a special date that no one else celebrates.

Once it’s enveloped you, you fold it away again, smoothing down the fabric with your fingers in a private ritual, like the most sacred of things. 

It was a crisp October day when the world ended, the kind where you can wear just a jumper, so I didn’t have a coat on when the sky shattered and fell down around me. 

Today, 29th October 2023, is 10 years since my university house doorway became the backdrop of my most tragic scene as I was delivered the cruellest news. ‘They didn’t want to tell you over the phone’, my aunt said, and with that sentence I knew immediately what she was going to say next. 

My dad had passed away.