He thought no one noticed, but I did. I always noticed things that people thought they could hide when everyone else turned their heads away, and turned their eyes to the ground, and turned their ears to themselves, and tuned their thoughts on themselves. But I noticed. He thought no one noticed but he closed his eyes when everyone turned their heads to look.

I breathed in.

I breathed out

No one noticed.

I knew something was wrong before my parents uttered another word. I could tell Kyla knew something was wrong as well as her tears tattooed her cheeks. She uttered a single word, “why?” to which my parents had no response. She was only six, how could she understand? I was only nine, how could I understand?

I didn’t understand so I breathed in.

I breathed out.

No one noticed. It was all I could do to seem composed, I had to be there for my sister, to show her somehow it would be ok. We still had no idea what was going on, but it was going to be change. The change that people don’t just bounce back from because they never knew how to function before hand so how could they know how to function after. Before we learned how to live on our own and think on our own and feel on our own, we were forced to look out for someone else. I didn’t understand. All I understood was this was change, this was pain. And so I distanced myself. I looked at it through unfamiliar eyes. This wasn’t my life; this was someone else’s that I was allowed to watch. What an honor, I thought, to see someone else’s life without