I have nothing to make you stay.

My sister’s words bounce off the walls of the now empty room where a family used to reside like a hollowed out cavern absent to love and life.  Dead.

Each time a family member walks up, seeking to reconnect I turn the light on, open the space, and ready it up with hope and the potential of renewal, eager to see if they will stay.

I am not sure what it is they are expecting here, what preconceived ideas fill their heads, but when they see my place is filled with me, they leave.

I am uncertain what they hope to find, what part of them they think I hold, but all I have to offer them is me. Isn’t that a line in a country western song?

In the past I had a magic family room, I could turn you into the best sister by not looking or hearing or watching your actions, I could delete and erase parts of you that were unkind; now the magic mirror is gone. 

It must be shocking to feel the absence of magic, the void where pretend use to lie and instead of the delusional mirror, there is the reflection of you. 

I know for it is just as shocking to me too.

You enter alone, you fill the space, and only you.  No smoke and mirrors to trick me into seeing a loving sister where there stands one ‘not that interested’.

I love that inside of me there is no trickery, no false ideals, no pretend place, but instead reality is shone even brighter.

My voice is able to speak what I need to say, to ask what I need to know, and I have the inner fortitude to witness your answer and to withstand the disappointment as I shut the light and close the door.

There was nothing inside me you were interested in.

I have nothing to make you stay.