What Wren Carried — 02: Who He Chose to Speak To

I told the story of things we never expect to happen to us to a friend today. while listening, he paused and made a simple remark. he asked me why, out of all the people around him, he chose to talk to me about this.

I had not thought about that before.

The question forced me to re examine that friendship, or me and Wren, and the role I played in his life. honestly, it was not much. we enjoyed each other’s company. we hung out only a few times. nothing that would normally qualify as closeness.

Yet as I thought more carefully, memories surfaced. his excitement when we met. the ease of his smile. how genuinely happy he seemed in those moments. and then another realization followed. he was never someone surrounded by people. he did not have many friends. he was often alone.

And slowly, uncomfortably, it occurred to me that I might have been his only friend.

Later that day, I messaged him to check on how he was doing. he told me he felt drained. very sick, very exhausted. he admitted that he had not told his family. he had not told his friends. he had only told me.

I had not asked whether anyone else knew. still, the weight of it landed on me. I felt guilty for not noticing earlier that he might have needed help. he was scared. frightened. And as we talked, it became clear that it was not only the illness that made things hard to endure.

He was going through a shift, a subtle one. A reshaping of how he saw his life, and himself, and what lay ahead. there were recent realizations that left him unsteady.

Listening to him, I was pulled back to a time in my own life when I went through something similar . A moment when the ground moved beneath me, and nothing felt secure anymore. where I was afraid of my own thoughts.

Maybe I can share that with him. maybe speaking from that place will help him feel less alone. maybe that is why he chose to speak to me in the first place.