Chapter 09 · 4 min 26 sec
Always In Your Corner
The phone call that changes the quality of darkness — someone always present.
Lyrics· 315 words
There'll be nights when the road disappears And every mile feels longer than the years When your own reflection turns away And you don't recognize the face You think you've gone too far this time Crossed some invisible line That nobody could understand You'll be wrong
There'll be days when the words come sharp When anger speaks before the heart When mistakes leave marks like rain on stone And you carry them alone You'll tell yourself you've broken things Beyond what hands can mend And you'll be wrong again Because love was never built for perfect days
It was built for this When the lights go out, when the walls cave in When the whole world tells you where you've been I'll still be here, like I've always been In your corner, in your corner You don't have to win, you don't have to prove anything to me To deserve this room
I'll still be here, like I've always been In your corner Maybe one day you'll understand The things I never found the words to say That some people love like open doors Even after storms, even after years Even after silence built So fall apart if you need to
Lose your way if you must stay The light left on the chair that still pulled out The voice that says come in When the lights go out, when the sky comes down When you're standing in the wreckage Looking around I'll still be here, like I've always been In your corner, in your corner
Not because you're perfect, not because you're strong Not because you've never done anything wrong I'll still be here, until the river meets the sea Until these old bones leave me In your corner, one day when I'm gone And you're wondering if you were enough Remember this, you never had to earn my love You already had it
*A story about love that watches*
It was Clara's first time away from home.
The school trip was three days in the mountains — hiking, campfires, the kind of adventure that everyone seemed to find easy except Clara, who had spent the first night in her sleeping bag wondering if she'd made a mistake.
She had a good time, in the end. She didn't get lost on the hike. She made friends with a girl from the other class. She ate things she would have refused at home and found them fine.
On the third night, around the campfire, someone asked what she missed most about home.
"My mum's light," she said, without thinking.
The other kids looked at her.
"What do you mean?" asked the girl from the other class.
Clara thought about how to explain it. "My mum stays up late," she said. "She reads, or works, or I'm not sure what she does. But there's always a light under her door when I go to bed. Even at midnight. Even at two in the morning."
"And you like that?"
"I never thought about it," Clara said. "I just always knew it was there."
She realised, saying it, that she had never once told her mum she noticed. It had just been a fact of her life, like the colour of the walls or the smell of the kitchen. Something she couldn't imagine not existing.
On the bus home, she thought about all the small things like that — things her mum did without making a thing of them. The lunch packed before Clara was even awake. The extra blanket put at the foot of her bed in autumn. The way her mum would come to the door and just stand there, not saying anything, when Clara was having a hard day.
When they arrived back at the school and she saw her mum waiting in the car park, Clara walked faster than she meant to.
"How was it?" her mum said.
"Good," said Clara. She hugged her longer than usual. "Do you know there's a light under your door? At night?"
Her mum pulled back slightly to look at her. "Yes," she said. "I know."
"I like it," Clara said. "I just wanted you to know that I like it."
Her mum's face did something complicated and kind, and she pulled Clara back into the hug.
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*Love often shows itself in the small things — the ones we only notice when they're not there.*
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