sorry (microfiction)

28.10.2025

A: Your anger is too much. You are hurting people. You are saying things just because you are angry.

S: I am an angry person. I’ve always been an angry person.

A: You need to find some other way to get rid of it. You know how much it upsets you when you upset someone. The guilt completely consumes you.

S: Not when I’m angry. But yes, I genuinely feel sorry that I have hurt anyone. I did not mean to do it. I didn’t think it out. I made mistakes.

A: Why not just say sorry?

S: No one ever accepts an apology.

A: Really?

S: Well, a good friend did recently. But usually not.

A: Find some way to control your anger. Then you would not have to say sorry.

S: It seems like every emotion I have, I have to apologise for it. Maybe the best thing would be not to have any emotions at all. Isn’t that the ideal of Hinduism? Emotion is a cloud…

A: Your problem…

S: My problem is that when someone upsets me,maybe I should tell them I am upset with them. And then maybe I would hear sorry instead of having to say it all the time. Maybe I should only talk to people that can communicate directly in words what they are saying too. Because then I don’t have to read their expressions and their minds. Which I can’t do.

A: No one is going to communicate directly to you. They don’t. You can’t do it yourself. That is the problem for everyone.

S: The problem is that I’m sorry. And I can’t say it. And what good would it do? It is another emotion that you cannot express, regret. And then you wonder why I am so angry. It is the one emotion that a man is allowed to express. And even my anger, I am not allowed to express it fully. You see? There is no emotion that you can express. Tell me something, how do you express your anger fully? Surely you would not have me bottle it up inside?

A: Listen…

S: Everyone has moved on in life. The bridges have all been broken. I don’t have any bridges connecting me to anyone any more. Anything I did that hurt anyone, I am sorry for. But what is the point of anything now? The boats have floated away from each other. Some things, I am still not sorry for. Some things I am sorry for. The people that I most wanted to impress, they are disappointed. That is life. And I am not going to offer explanations and excuses. No one listens to them.

A: Has anyone ever said sorry to you?

S: Yes.

A: And what did you do?

S: I accepted their apology.

A: How long ago?

S: Just yesterday. Many times. Certain friends.

A: What do you think of the sorry?

S: If someone feels bad and wants to say sorry for something, I just forgive them. Because they are reaching out to you and they care about you and want to keep things as they’re going. That’s what I see a sorry as.

A: But you realise, for some people, sorry doesn’t mean anything.

S: Maybe nothing means anything in this life. I am going to sleep. One time a Punjabi guest came to the house. And when they left, they said to forgive them if they had committed any mistakes. Maybe that is all you can do in this life, whether the sorry is heard or accepted or not. There is an intention behind a sorry, if you could recognise it.