My father never uttered the words “I love you,” but every morning before heading to the office, I double-checked that my window was securely fastened.

My father never spoke the words “I love you.”
Yet each morning before leaving for work, he checked my window was securely shut.
Hed leave early, lunchbox in hand, placing a glass of milk on the table.
I pretended to sleep, never bidding farewell, but listening as his footsteps faded quietly away.
He never asked about my grades, but fresh notebooks appeared before each term ended.
No praise left his lips, but I caught his grin at my diploma when he assumed I wasnt watching.
As a child, I mistook love for declarations and embraces.
Time taught me not all love speaks aloud.
Some say it with calloused hands, with tiny actsunnoticed yet unwavering.
Years later, I returned unannounced on a winter night. The house felt hushed, shrunken.
At the kitchen table, my fatherhands worn, hair silveredglanced up, startled.
“Have you eaten?” he asked.
I smiled. The same question lingered in every poured glass, every bought notebook, every silent care.
That evening, I understood: his love was never mute. It lived in the sturdy walls he built, the meals he provided, the roof that never once failed.
Now I speak his dialect of lovenot with words, but with shared meals, open doors, quiet gestures that linger.
Because the softest loves resonate loudest in the end.