My husband used to tell me with a tired smile,
“Hang in there on your own until this month is over. Then we will all move to my village, near my parents. No more hard jobs overseas, no more layoffs.”

His words were like a balm to my exhausted soul.
At night, I dreamed of a simple life, with the children running around the dirt yard, with our parents chatting under the shade of the trees.
A life together. Finally together.

But then… Three days passed without news of him.
I called him over and over again. I sent him messages. Nothing.
I said to myself:
“Maybe you’re on night shift, maybe your phone ran out of battery…”

This morning, as I was dropping our son off at school, my phone rang.
On the other end of the line, a trembling voice uttered words that I will never forget:
“Sister… go quickly to the bridge… something happened to your husband.”

The world stopped.

I felt my heart break into a thousand pieces. I left my son with the neighbor and ran like a banshee.
When I arrived, I saw it…
Lying under the cold bridge, surrounded by police and neighbors whispering to each other.
His work shirt was dirty, his face pale… As if in his last moments, he had been waiting for something. Or someone?

A woman behind me murmured,
“For three nights, you saw him around here, walking alone… as if I were waiting for someone who never came.”

I shouted his name in despair, but it was too late.
The promise to return to the village together was suspended in the air, like a dream that was never fulfilled.

And under that bridge, where it all ended, my grief also began… for a future that will no longer be.