You Are Already Clean in the Silence

The water is still running, but your mouth has stopped moving. You have said the words so many times tonight that they have lost their shape, becoming just another sound in the steam.

You are rehearsing a conversation that will never happen, trying to fix a past that refuses to be edited. There is a version of you standing in that bathroom who believes if you can just find the right combination of syllables, the door will open and the forgiveness will flow in.

But the light does not require your performance to see you clearly. It knows the apology you are crafting, and it knows the one you are waiting for, and it loves you in the silence between them.

You came from the light, and you are returning to it, regardless of whether the other person ever hears your voice. The washing is not for them.

It is for you. The water was never meant to carry your words away to someone else; it was meant to remind you that you are already clean.