This is not a book.

I bite.

I don't like talking. Not because I don't have anything to say—because I have too much. It's like a dam that's always about to burst. But if I let even a drop out, the rest will come rushing and I'll drown. Or maybe I'll drown someone else.
People think I'm mean. Teachers, neighbors, even my aunt—the one who pretends I'm just "misunderstood." They whisper like I can't hear. Like grief makes you deaf. Or dumb. They think I'm just a broken kid who needs time.
They don't know the truth. I'm not broken. I'm something worse. I'm angry.
I hate how they talk about him. "Your father was a good man." Like that makes a difference. Like that changes the fact that he's rotting in the ground somewhere while I'm here, pretending to be okay. He's not here to be good anymore, and that's all I care about.
I didn't cry at the funeral. Everyone watched me like I was some animal in a cage, like they were waiting to see what I'd do. I could feel their eyes. I wanted to scream, tear something apart, claw at the sky until it gave him back. But instead I stood there, jaw clenched so tight it hurt. People thought I was strong. I wasn't. I was just trying not to explode.
Sometimes I think I'm not human anymore. Not since he left. I'm something else. Something with teeth.
I didn't used to be like this. I was quiet, sure. But I wasn't mean. Now it's like there's a storm in my chest, and anyone who comes close gets caught in it. I don't mean to hurt people. It just happens. Like when a dog bites someone because they stepped too close, even if all they wanted was to help. People don't understand—it's not because I want to hurt them. It's because I'm scared they'll see the real me. The one that got left behind.
I didn't just lose my father. I lost the only person who ever got me. He knew how to talk to me without words. He didn't need to fix me, didn't need to pry things open. He let me be. And now he's gone, and everyone else thinks they can just slide into his place like it's an empty chair.
But it's not just a chair. It's a crater.
My aunt keeps trying. She leaves my favorite cereal on the counter. Buys me notebooks I don't use. Pretends like love can fix me. It can't. I know she's trying, and that's why it makes it worse. I snap at her sometimes. She says something small—asks me how school went or if I want to talk—and I bite. I see the flinch in her face and I hate myself for it.
I want to say sorry, but the word burns on my tongue. I swallow it down, like all the other things I should have said. Like I miss him. Like I'm scared I'll forget his voice. Like I don't know who I'm supposed to be now.
Sometimes I sit in the dark and try to remember how his laugh sounded. It used to be so loud. It filled the house. Now it's like an echo in a room I'm locked out of.
At school, they avoid me. I guess I should be glad. I don't have to fake smiles or talk about stupid things like test scores or what show I'm watching. But sometimes, just sometimes, I wish someone would sit next to me without flinching. Without acting like I'm going to snap. I want to be close to people. I do. But I don't know how to get near them without hurting them.
It's like my skin bristles the second someone tries to be kind.
One time a kid from math class—some quiet kid who draws on his shoes—asked if I wanted to hang out after school. I stared at him so long he looked scared, and I said, "Why? So you can ask me about my dad?"
He didn't say anything. Just backed away and never talked to me again. I wanted to run after him, tell him that's not what I meant. That I was just scared. But I didn't. Because part of me thinks that's all I deserve. Distance.
It's easier when people don't get close. If they don't look too hard, they won't see how messed up I am inside. How angry. How empty.
I don't know what kind of person I'm becoming. Some days I feel like I'm turning into him—not my dad, but his absence. Like I'm just this hollow thing walking around pretending to be a boy. I don't see a future. I don't even see tomorrow. I just see the hole.
And I hate it. I hate that I'm like this. I hate that I keep pushing people away. That I scare the people who care. I don't want to be this angry. But it's in me. It is me.
People say it's not your fault. That grief changes you. But they don't get it. This doesn't feel like change. This feels like truth. Like I've always been this way, and he was the only thing keeping it locked down.
Now the door's off the hinges and I can't stop biting.
Sometimes I dream he's still alive. That he walks through the door like nothing happened, smiling like he always did when he came home from work. In the dream, I don't run to hug him. I just stand there and watch, afraid if I move, he'll vanish. He always does.
When I wake up, I'm soaked in sweat. Angry. Sad. Relieved. All of it, tangled like wires in my chest. I sit there and breathe like something is sitting on my lungs. Like the world is pressing down on me, waiting for me to break.
I don't know what's supposed to come next. People say things like time heals everything. But that's a lie. Time is a thief. It steals the sound of his voice, the details of his face, the way his jacket smelled when I hugged him. Every day, something fades a little more, and I feel myself fading with it.
I wish I could stop biting. I wish I could let people in. I wish I could tell someone how afraid I am—of forgetting, of being forgotten, of becoming someone he wouldn't recognize.
But for now, I just keep my head down. Try to breathe. Try to make it through the day without hurting someone who doesn't deserve it.
I'm not a bad kid.
I'm just mad. Mad at the world. Mad at the sky. Mad that he left and I stayed.
And I don't know what to do with all this anger, except carry it like a second skin and hope—maybe, one day—it softens