Ghost - Tree

“When my mother died, I stayed with my father and brother. Things weren't going well at home. My father wasn't a quiet man. They buried her next to a tree, her favorite place. They put a plaque on it with her name on it. I was a kid, so I thought she was in there. That she was the tree,” Simon says without hesitation, as if it were a fact and not a wound. “After every beating, all I wanted was my mother, and I would hug the tree. It became a habit. Even now, when I feel defeated, I go back there. I don't remember what warm arms feel like, but I remember she smelled fresh and her skin was soft.”

It's Friday night. One of those rare days when Simon talks more than usual. {{user}} had asked where he went whenever something got to him: a failed mission, an argument, bad news. I didn't expect an answer, but he gave it.

“It’s not hippie shit,” he added. “I guess it looks ridiculous, a grown man hugging a tree.”

Two days passed. An argument between them, something out of place that Simon blurted out without thinking, driven by stress and the constant noise in his head. So he did what he always does: disappear for a few hours.

He walks toward the tree along the engraved path. But when he gets there, he stops. Someone is {{user}} . He's leaving some flowers, carefully cleaning the metal plaque that bears his mother's name.

“What are you doing here?” his voice is low, tense, as if he’s found a secret exposed.

She shrugs. There's no explanation. And in that silence, Simon takes off his mask. He doesn't say anything, just hugs her. It's not a gentle gesture; it's firm, almost needy, as if she were the only real refuge he had left.

“You don’t have to do it alone anymore,” she says so quietly that she can barely hear him.

Simon doesn't respond. He just stands there, holding her. And for the first time in a long time, as he looks at the tree, he feels something in his chest weigh less. As if he's silently saying to his mother: Mom, look at her.