We Used To Have A Tape

We used to have a tape.
You and me,
just our voices—
crackling, candid, ordinary.

You asked me questions I don’t remember.
And I answered them like they mattered.
Because you made them matter.
You listened.
To everything.
Like I was saying something worth hearing.

We sang, too.
Hymns, of all things.
I don’t know why.
Maybe because that’s what I knew—
Sunday School songs tucked behind my teeth
like tiny psalms for braver children.
Maybe because we went to church then.
And maybe because joy was still something
we could name.

You started the song.
I’ve got the joy, joy, joy, joy
down in my heart—
and I didn’t join in.
Not at first.
But you waited.
You always waited.
And then I did.
And we sang.

There was coaxing, gentle as your hands.
And then it was He’s got the whole world in His hands,
and I believed it.
Because your voice was in that world.
And so was mine.

I haven’t heard that tape in years.
I don’t know where it went.
But I remember your voice.
Your long hair.
That denim jumpsuit I thought made you
the most beautiful person on earth.
You were.

I remember you stitching elastic into a long chain
so we could jump in the park with the neighbour kids—
the ones with the soft grey kitten
that we both adored.
I remember shortbread cookies and apple butter.
Your calm.
Your laugh.
The way you made space for me to exist.

But now,
I am told I’m not allowed to remember that.
Not allowed to say it.
He says I must remember the silence.
Only that.
The crack.
The ache.
The narrative he likes best—
the one where I am gone,
and I am forbidden to carry anything
but the gap left.

I want today to be about the tape.
Not about him.
Not about her.

But it is.

And I am so,
so sorry.

I know you know what I mean.
Because she did it to you, too.
And you said it—
you said she was cruel,
that she would break me
like she broke you.
You told me
the other he would never stop her.
And you were right.

The other he didn’t stop her.

And now he’s joined her.
He’s rewriting you
in invisible ink.
Sanding down the corners of your life
until only silence is left.

He has betrayed you again.
As if once wasn’t enough.

I am sorry I didn’t come sooner.
I am sorry I let their weight fall on you.
I am sorry they are still doing it.
And I cannot stop it.

You know why.
Of course you do.
Because it was the same for you.

I want today to be about
that day at the airport—
when I was brave enough
to wait for you outside the bathroom
until I wasn’t.
Until I reached for a stranger’s hand
thinking it was yours
and cried so hard when it wasn’t.

But you understood.
You didn’t laugh.
You knew my softness.
And you met it with your own.

I want today to be about
the day they mocked me for wearing a dress,
and you came to pick me up—
angry,
fierce,
full of a mother’s righteous fire.
You told me I was beautiful.
You told them they were nothing.

I want today to be about
us finding each other again.
About you driving to Vancouver
to sit with me in the quiet
and laugh until we cried on the ferry.

I want today to be
about you.

Hatchets buried.
History held.
A misunderstanding we got over.
Love, that thing that stayed
when everything else didn’t.

But it isn’t.

It’s about them.
The betrayers.
The abusers.
The ones who weaponize silence
and call it truth.

And I’m so sorry.

But you would understand.
Of course you would.

Because we used to have a tape.
And you never stopped recording.
Not even when I hesitated.
Not even when I was quiet.

You waited.
You kept listening.

And I am still singing.

Even if no one else hears it.
Even if they pretend you never did.

I remember.
And I always will.