The desk clock blinked 5:13 AM, casting a harsh blue light across the clutter. A lone donut half, petrified under the morning’s chill, sat beside a coffee mug stained with the brown ghosts of past nights. In the center, bathed in the phone’s soft glow, a toddler’s smile seemed to mock the chaos around it.
He, the man behind the mess, was lost in the labyrinthine paths of online dating. Profiles blurred across his screen, a parade of curated smiles and carefully crafted bios. Each face an answer to a question not yet asked, a solution to a problem whose shape he couldn’t quite grasp. A second wife, a bonus child, and now… a third?
His ex-wife’s accusation, a whispered rumor swirling like dust motes, flickered at the edge of his mind. Violence. Was it true? Did it matter? He’d buried that past, built a new life on its ashes. A wife, another woman’s child, theirs now. It was all so tangled, a chaotic knot woven from second chances and borrowed dreams.
His fingers hovered over the send button, but doubt coiled in his gut. Did he truly seek love, or another piece to fill the gaps in his fractured family? Was another face, another smile, really the answer?
A sudden chime pierced the silence. His phone, resting amidst the detritus, displayed a message from ‘Station Kharkiv’. Their tireless work, a stark contrast to his own aimless pursuit, weighed heavily on him. Thousands in need, volunteers risking their lives for basic necessities, while he… scrolled through profiles, yearning for an image of happiness.
Shame, acrid and raw, flooded his insides. The screen went dark, the toddler’s smile swallowed by the encroaching dawn. He knew then, his need wasn’t love, but redemption.
Leaving the phone untouched, he stepped away from the desk, the clatter of mugs and markers a muted drumbeat beneath his resolve. Kharkiv beckoned, not with the promise of a new wife, but with the chance to mend something broken, something real. As dawn painted the sky, he knew his path was no longer paved with pixels and bios, but with the footprints of those who dared to heal, not hearts, but a nation.
The toddler’s smile, perhaps, wasn’t a mockery, but a silent plea. A plea for a father who, instead of seeking solace in empty profiles, chose to build a home where everyone belonged, not just through marriage, but through love, earned not promised.
What we are doing and who is eligible to receive the support.
Comments