I hated the dark.
I finished high school with honors and got into university.
I told myself blindness couldn’t stop me, even though, more than anything in the world, I dreamed of seeing again.
Every year, I went to a specialist for checkups. Most of them were routine, but I still clung to hope.
During one of those visits, when I was 24, I met someone who changed my life.
He introduced himself as Nigel, a new ophthalmic surgeon who’d joined the practice.
His voice hit me like a faint echo from childhood.
I still clung to hope.
“Do we know each other?” I asked the first time we spoke. I tilted my head toward him, trying to place that tone.
It was warm but careful, like someone stepping around broken glass.
There was a pause, almost too long.
“No,” he said, with a smile in his voice. “I don’t believe we do.”
