No Need to Say Goodbye

There are moments that feel like endings,
but really, they’re just the quiet part before a return.

The last time you see a certain sunset before you leave home.
The way a friend hugs you without words because goodbyes are too sharp to say out loud.
The suitcase zipped up while your heart is still tangled in the bedsheets you’re leaving behind.

But not everything that ends stays gone.

Sometimes, a feeling begins small—just a flicker—and grows into something that changes you. A hope. A whisper. A promise. Something you carry with you, even when you don't know you're carrying it.

You follow a light in the distance. You grow. You fall. You become someone new.

And then one day, maybe when you're not even looking for it, you feel something old and familiar stir inside you—like hearing a song you used to love without remembering why. Like standing in a place you've never been before and knowing exactly where everything is.

That’s the kind of magic this world holds:
The magic of coming back.
Not to what was, but to what still lives in you. The things that shaped you. The love that stayed.

Just because everything’s changing doesn’t mean you’ve lost what mattered.
You’re not lost either.
You’re just wandering toward the next part of the story.

So if you ever feel forgotten, or left behind, or like you’re the only one who remembers—
Don’t let go.
Let your memories grow louder and brighter until they light the path back.

Because one day, when the world calls your name, you’ll return.
And no one will need to say goodbye.

And maybe when you come back, it won’t be to the exact same place. Maybe the house is gone, the garden overgrown, the porchlight off. But that doesn’t mean the love is gone.
It lives in you now—in your voice, in your kindness, in the way you make tea for someone who’s had a hard day.

You are the soft place now. You are the memory that will carry someone else home someday.

So keep going.
Pick a star on the horizon and follow the light.
Even when it gets quiet. Even when you’re unsure.

This story started as a feeling.
And then it turned into you.

When the world changes, let your heart remember what stayed true.

by Onnaya