The Ribbons Remember

 

She was still small when she noticed it first the way her mother’s hands moved with purpose, tying ribbons as though each knot held a secret. The red fabric curled and twisted, catching the light, never just decoration but something heavier, older.

“Why always red?” she asked, her voice curious, tugging at the edge of the ribbon roll.

Her mother smiled, though her eyes stayed on the knot. “Because red remembers. It ties together not only what you see, but what you cannot.”

The girl did not understand then, but she felt it. The hush in the room, the weight of the color. She thought ribbons were meant for gifts, for hair, for celebration. But here, tied across doors, around wrists, across branches, they seemed like guardians. Silent, watchful, waiting.

Years later, she would learn the whispers: that ribbons, long ago, were charms against misfortune, threads of protection, promises bound in fabric. That when tied in red, they meant not just beauty, but defiance against what might come undone.

And she still wonders

was it the ribbon that remembered her, or was it she who learned to remember through the ribbon?