My little brother kept the bus ticket from the day I left home

Dear Delyara, I left Ghana at twenty-four to work abroad. My brother was eleven. At the bus station, he cried so badly that I became angry with him because I was trying not to cry myself. I told him to stop behaving like a baby. Then I boarded the bus to the airport and did not come home for six years. He is thirty now. Today, while visiting, he opened an old wallet and showed me a faded bus ticket from that morning. I recognized the date before he said anything. He had picked it up from the ground after the bus left. For nineteen years, he kept it. I asked why. He shrugged and said, “That was the day you went away.” Not accusing. Just fact. I have always told the story of leaving as sacrifice: hard work, remittances, loneliness, building something for the family. My brother remembers it as the morning his sister disappeared behind bus windows. He told me he used to carry the ticket to school because he thought if he kept something from the journey, I might come back sooner. I wanted to apologize for making him cry. Instead, I apologized for telling him not to. Some children are not being dramatic when they beg you not to go. Sometimes they are correctly understanding how long six years will feel.