The Speech I Never Gave

Good evening.

Or maybe it was morning. I honestly don't remember. The light was too bright on that stage, the room too filled with noise I wasn't part of. I only remember the pressure—the kind that sits in your chest like a stone tied to silence.

They told us to write a graduation speech. A celebration, they said. A thank you to the people who made us who we are.

I watched the others go up—quoting Maya Angelou, thanking their parents, cheering on the future. My hands were sweating through the sleeves of a borrowed gown. My knees locked. I stood on that stage like someone who had snuck in from the wrong story.

I was too tall for the dress I'd been given. Too quiet. Too stiff. And too aware of the fact that no one out there was watching for me.

Still, I scanned the crowd.

I knew she wouldn't come.

But I looked anyway.

I imagined it—her in the back, standing between strangers, smiling. Maybe mouthing the words, "I'm proud of you." Maybe lifting a camera and waving. Maybe… just maybe.

Instead, there was no one. Not really.

My cousin had her whole family around her, clapping like she'd cured cancer. Friends were wrapped in arms, flashbulbs catching their best angles, framed in the kind of love you can hang on a wall.

I stood there with a borrowed smile and my heart in quarantine.

I didn't know what to do with my arms. I stood too stiff, too awkward, hoping someone might come up and talk to me. I was sixteen, but I felt five. I felt like a child again—hollow and waiting. Like maybe if I waited long enough, someone would come and say, "Good job." Someone would ask me, "What's next for you?" Someone would see me.

But no one did.

My father showed up after. He stood beside me like someone trying to look useful at a funeral. We didn't speak much. We didn't take a photo. He didn't ask what my favorite part of the day was or what I was dreaming about next.

He was there, and somehow still not.

That moment sat inside me for years. Pressed into the lining of my ribs. Scratching at the skin from the inside out. Bitterness, yes—but more than that. A kind of dry ache. Like a dry heave when the grief's too stubborn to come out. A kind of bone-deep jealousy I never gave voice to. Because how could I miss what I never had?

But that's the lie I told myself. That I didn't want it. That I was above it.

I did want it.

I craved it.

The simple belonging. The way their parents clutched them and grinned, whispering, "You did it," as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

No one told me I did it. No one helped me stand up there. No one handed me a ribbon. No one said I mattered.

But I stood anyway.

I stood because somewhere, deep inside, I kept pushing myself forward. I told myself, "Dust off your dress." Wipe off the tears no one sees. Smile like it fits. Plaster that triumphant look on your face. No one can see the pain. And walk because no one else is going to pick you up."

They asked us to write a speech about who got us where we are today.

They expected me to say: "I couldn't have done it without them."

But the truth is: I couldn't have done it without me.

Without the version of me who, at three years old, stood barefoot on a salt-bitten road, crying after a mother who never looked back. Who walked away like I was a suitcase she'd finally dropped.

Without the version of me who braided her own hair with trembling fingers. Who signed her own report cards. Who learned how to fill out forms and fend off silence. Who cried into a pillow when the monsters outside felt safer than the ones inside.

Without the girl who learned to bury grief so deep, it turned to stone.

And without the woman who still thinks about that stage. Who still clenches her jaw when she hears the word "celebrate." Who still hasn't cried for what she lost.

Because crying would have made it real.

And there's something terrifying about unraveling in front of people who never bothered to know you.

I kept those tears locked up. Safe. In a vault behind my ribs. A cascade waiting for permission.

They're still there.

I imagine them like a river swelling behind a dam. One day they might break free. Drown everything.

But until then, I carry them.

Because even pain becomes a kind of home.

And I've lived there a long time.

I've memorized the rooms. Decorated the silence. I've learned how to survive on crumbs of comfort. I've learned how to flavor my days with grit and ink. How to feed myself on words—words I never heard, words I never got to say. They taste like salt and honey. Regret and resilience.

No one told me I was worthy.

So I told it to myself.

And maybe—just maybe—that's enough.

I didn't get the manual for life. No instructions for how to ask for love. No chapters on how to unlearn shame. No table of contents for how to feel seen.

But I wrote my own pages. Blood and bone. Ink and will.

And now, at forty-four, I know something I didn't back then:

The world is big enough to hold my dreams.

The world is wide enough to make room for my voice.

And every time I get up after falling, every time I whisper "get up, girl"—

That's me.

That's always been me.

So this is the speech I never gave.

No applause. No roses. No proud mother in the crowd.

But still, I rise.

And this time, I'm not looking for anyone.

Just the version of me who kept going.

To her—I say:

You did it.

And I see you.

And I'm proud.

And this time, we cry together.