It was happening again. The same surroundings, same situation, same people. In the dining room that once emitted warmth and comfort so effortlessly, Elena and her family sat at the round marble table. There was not a sound to be heard other than the occasional clinking of metal against glass as her siblings relentlessly scraped the last of their porridge from their bowls. Elena looked up from the bowl of porridge that she had been stirring absent-mindedly. Not even a drop of it had made its way into her mouth. She simply did not have the appetite at the moment.
Her eyes slowly moved from first one familiar face to yet another. Her father, her elder brother, her younger sister, and... Taking a deep yet shaky breath to somehow ease the tightness in her chest, her eyes slowly drifted to the empty chair beside her father. The chair that had been empty for nearly 5 years. A huge wave of grief and longing came crashing down and Elena felt tears spring to her eyes readily as if they had been eagerly waiting in hiding for the moment where she would slip up and give in to her swirling emotions. She truly missed that person.
Yet, despite everything, Elena did not allow her face to betray even a single bit of what she felt. Her eyes once again flickered to her family's faces, this time taking them in more attentively. All of them had that same lively and carefree look on their faces, as if they were completely oblivious to the distinct absence of that person that had been with them for so long. Through the thin veil of tears that now blurred her vision, she vaguely saw her brother raise a questioning eyebrow in her direction. It felt like deja vu. How many times had this exact same scene happened? Elena wasn't sure anymore. Holding back ber glistening tears, Elena forced her lips into a smile, shaking her head to signal to her brother that she was fine. Of course, she wasnt. But forget it, whenever she brought up that person, her missing and longing were often brushed aside as dramatic and insignificant anyways. She had never been able to mourn the loss of that person openly, but Elena knew deep in her heart that despite what people often told her, time could not heal all wounds. There were some, which, no matter how long, would still hurt and ache, leaving a deep void in the depths of her very soul. Was she the only one who had such wounds? Elena did not know, but she was rather sure that this was a pain she would both reluctantly and willingly bear for the rest of her life in order to remember that person which once shed light onto her dreary days.
