Grief

We weren’t friends

I’ve kind of known who you were for 20 years because we worked for the same company

In the same building

With some of the same people

I didn’t like you

You were sexist in that casual way that a certain kind of a certain age of a certain man in a certain part of a certain country can be

By chance

Our schedules aligned and only you and I were in our section of the office for an hour or so each morning

So we would have small talk

You commented on my cubicle deco and how your grown kids (although you and I were of  a generation) were into some of that nerdy horror stuff and how you supported their art and lives

I would nod in assent thinking of all the things I’d heard you say before to me and others and not sure if I wanted to engage enough to risk hearing those things again assuming you hadn’t changed in those years

I still don’t know if you could have or did and never will now, I guess

What is that feeling called when someone you’ve barely known for 20 years but spoke to on a mostly surface level a few days a week for a year suddenly dies?