what we don't see

We reached the airport, and she was very stressed, looking around. The signs, the gates, the crowd, all of it seemed too fast for her. I held her arm gently, told her it was simple, just follow me. She nodded, but her eyes kept moving, taking in everything, like she was trying to memorize the place in case she got lost.

The flight itself was short, barely an hour, but for her it felt like an event. She held the armrest tightly during takeoff, then slowly relaxed, looking out the window at the clouds. I caught her smiling, a small one, the kind she didn't know I noticed. She whispered something about how different it looked from up here, how small everything became.

When we landed, she was quieter than usual. We took a cab to the house, an old place, the kind with a gate that creaks and a dog that barks more out of habit than alarm. The family came out before we even reached the door, aunts, an uncle, cousins I barely remembered. There were hugs, there was noise, there was that warmth that only comes from people who have known each other for decades, even with gaps in between.

I stood a little to the side, watching. My mother's face changed, something in it softened, like pieces of her that had been folded away for years were unfolding again. She laughed in a way I hadn't heard before, easy, unguarded. I realized then that I was seeing a version of her that existed before me, before all the responsibilities, before time pulled her in different directions.

We sat for hours. Tea, then food, then more tea. Stories came out, old ones, about people who had passed, about places that didn't exist anymore. My mother talked about the railway trips, and everyone laughed, remembering the same things, finishing each other's sentences. I just listened, the way I always do.

At one point, an old woman, someone's grandmother, looked at me for a long time. Then she said, "You have his eyes." Nobody explained who "he" was. My mother's smile faded for a second, just a second, then she changed the subject quickly, too quickly.

I didn't ask. Some things, you let them sit. But I noticed it, the way I notice most things. And later, on the flight back, my mother was quiet again, staring out the window, somewhere far from the clouds. I didn't say anything either. Some things stick with you, even when nobody explains why.

I paraphrased with AI;
Thank you for reading.

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