has driven a wedge between us.
Silent distance
A pain that is not shared ends up erecting walls. I was in mourning alone, while Julien seemed to be moving forward, unperturbed. Little by little, a dull anger replaced my sadness. Conversations have become rarer, silences have become heavier, becoming almost palpable.
In the end, our paths diverged. Without drama, without outbursts. Just the slow wear and tear of two solitudes that no longer understood each other. I left the city to try to be reborn elsewhere. He has rebuilt a life on his own. We never spoke to each other again.
The belated revelation
A dozen years later, I learned of his sudden death. Against all odds, the pain caught up with me with a forgotten violence. A few days after the funeral, there was a knock on my door: it was his second wife. Her voice trembling, she told me that she had to entrust me with something essential.
She told me about a lake. A peaceful corner of nature, surrounded by trees, that I had almost erased from my memory. It was the secret refuge of Julien and our son, a haven of silence and complicity far from the hustle and bustle of the world.
