@Xorqa 25 June 2025 more from that month

The Day My Shadow Didn’t Follow Me I didn’t notice it at first. I got out of bed the same way I always do. Stretched. Yawned. Dragged my feet toward the window. The sun was already up, soft and golden. But something… felt different. I looked down. There was no shadow. Just light. No outline of my body on the floor. No thin, lazy shape chasing behind me as I walked. Just emptiness where something familiar should’ve been. At first, I thought maybe the sun had shifted. Maybe the curtains filtered the light in some strange way. But then I walked outside. And still — nothing. The trees had shadows. The birds. The benches. The streetlight poles. Even my neighbor’s barking dog. But me? I had none. I sat on a bench in the park, heart racing quietly. And for the first time in my life… I felt like I wasn’t really here. Had I become invisible? Was I fading? Or had something simply… given up on following me? My shadow had seen everything. Every laugh. Every fall. Every moment I wanted to disappear. It had followed me through heartbreak, illness, loneliness. It knew the real me. The version of me I never showed anyone. And now, it was gone. I don’t know what it means to lose a shadow. But somehow, it felt like losing a part of myself. Like the quiet parts inside me finally left. Like even my darkness got tired of being dragged along. So I walked home. No one noticed anything. But I knew. I felt it — the weight of absence. Sometimes it’s not what you see that breaks you. It’s what you don’t. I don’t know if it’ll return tomorrow. Maybe it’s resting. Maybe it’s gone forever. But tonight, when I lie in bed… I’ll leave a little space beside me. Just in case it decides to come back. 🖤 🔚 Reflection: This was a mysterious short story — but behind the mystery, there’s a quiet truth. Sometimes, we feel like even our own shadow — the part that always stays — has left us. In those moments, we don’t need to panic. We just need to pause… and breathe. Because even shadows come back when the light is right. Even loneliness fades when we walk a little further. You’re not disappearing. You’re just in a moment between two kinds of light. So keep walking. Your shadow — and your strength — is closer than you think. ☀️🖤