My biggest mistake is my inability to keep my innermost thoughts to myself. Sometimes, it is adding one spoon of sugar to my coffee instead of just sticking to two spoons.

So when I told Grumpy, “I like it when you don’t talk to me,” it was meant to fizzle out in the thick air of silence that he’d created, but the thing about words and intent is that they never align.

It’s like shaving your head in winter.

He looked at me, straightened his trousers, took his car keys and left.

My greatest strength lies in my child-like ability to bounce back from a few disappointments. My threshold is three disappointments a week.

So when it felt like I could not breathe for two days and when nothing seemed to ease me out of the web of worry I had weaved around myself, I resorted to prayer, but even that did not seem to help. I couldn’t get the words out of my mouth. I tried but choked on my tears, silenced a scream and for hours…the beating of my heart threatened to wear me out.

I have never known such fear…and that’s when Grumpy called.

It was not his call I was expecting.

At such a time…but I answered it nonetheless…

“Hey, I know I am hogging the line when you want to hear from her. She’s fine. God’s got this and even if he doesn’t, he’s sent a great team to see to it that she makes it out alive.”

So, I held onto my breath…paced up and down in the dark, and sometime at half past five in the morning when it was too hot to pace and I was lying on the cold cement floor, I got a text from her.

It was not enough and it was until I heard her voice that finally…the beating of my heart reminded me of the sheer calm after overcoming a storm and it was there, in the quiet that I knew love is my only strength and on the opposite side, across the street, lies worry…and she’s a crazy catalyst.