I sat in the parked car after work

Dear Delyara, I got home and didn’t go inside straight away. The house was there, of course. Curtains half drawn, one upstairs light on, the shape of evening already waiting. And I knew exactly what would happen the second I opened the door. I would stop being one person and become ten useful ones at once. So I stayed in the car. No phone. No music. Just both hands in my lap and a few quiet minutes where no one could ask me anything yet. I don’t stay there because I hate my family. I stay there because I need a border. Because the gap between work-self and home-self is too small, and some nights I need to build that bridge myself in silence before I walk across it.