☕ Coffee and Quiet with Derek Wolf
In the Arms of the Angel
The engine is off. The car wrapped in quiet. The radio playing a song she almost forgot she loved. The voice is soft and steady, a kind of ache made beautiful. It is Angel by Sarah McLachlan, a song she once turned away from because it felt too close to the truth.
Steam gathers on the windshield, softening the edges of the world. She pulls the blanket closer and lets the music fill the space around her. The song carries a sadness that feels familiar, the kind that lives not in the heart but in the bones, deep where the memories rest.
For weeks she has been carrying too much. The guilt that will not rest. The weight of old choices. The silence beneath every word she tries to say. Her hands rest on the steering wheel, fingers numb from gripping too long. She is not broken, only tired of holding everything together. It has been so long since she felt peace that she can no longer tell if peace is still possible.
The world outside the car is still. The streetlights hum faintly. A single bird calls in the distance, unsure if morning has truly arrived. Inside, she sits between night and day, between what was and what could be. Her eyes close for a moment, and she lets the lyrics move through her without resistance.
The song drifts like breath. Each word lands with a quiet honesty. You are pulled from the wreckage of your silent reverie. She knows what that means. The wreckage is her own. The silent reverie is the story she keeps telling herself that everything is fine.
She wants to cry but even that feels far away. Her eyes burn, but no tears come. Instead, she stares through the fogged glass and lets herself be still. No pretending. No fixing. No explanations. Only stillness. The kind that holds you when you have nothing left to give.
She remembers a night long ago when she heard this same song after losing someone she loved. Back then, it felt unbearable. It reminded her of absence. Of loss that had no name. She had turned it off after the first verse, afraid of what might surface if she stayed. Now she lets it play all the way through. It hurts, but it also heals. The pain has changed shape. It no longer demands. It simply asks to be witnessed.
Then the line comes, the one that always lingers. You are in the arms of the angel. May you find some comfort here.
She used to think that meant escape. That the angel was death or release from life. Now she wonders if it means something simpler. Maybe the angel is not departure, but arrival. Maybe it is the mercy of finally letting go of the fight. The grace of sitting still enough to remember she does not have to earn rest.
Her breath slows. The ache in her chest loosens. It feels like being forgiven, though no one has spoken a word. She has spent so long trying to fix what was never fully hers to carry. The music reminds her that surrender is not weakness. It is returning to the rhythm she forgot she belonged to.
She turns off the radio. The hum lingers in the air like a ghost of sound that has not yet learned silence. In that quiet she feels weightless. Empty in the best way. Not hollow, but open. Light enough to breathe again.
Outside, a faint gold begins to touch the edge of the horizon. The light catches the windshield and breaks into soft streaks across the glass. She wipes the fog with her sleeve and watches the day appear slowly, as if the world itself is learning how to wake.
She starts the car but leaves the blanket around her shoulders. The road ahead glows faintly in the new light. She drives without hurry, each mile washing away another layer of heaviness. The morning feels different. The world feels possible again.
At the first stoplight, she catches her reflection in the side window. The face looking back at her is not the same one that arrived here in the dark. The softness around her eyes is new. Not from relief alone, but from mercy. The quiet kind that asks for nothing but truth. She touches her cheek lightly, a gesture of recognition. A promise to keep this peace alive once she returns to the noise of the day.
There will still be hard mornings. The ache will return sometimes without warning. But now she knows where to go when it does. Not away from life, but into stillness. Into the quiet arms of something unseen yet always near. Into the mercy that waits for her in the simplest act of breathing and being.
The light shifts again, washing the dashboard in gold. She presses her palm against the warmth of the wheel and whispers, barely audible, thank you. It is not to anyone in particular. It is to the stillness itself. To the music. To the moment that reminded her that peace is not gone. It was only waiting for her to stop running long enough to feel it again.
The Truth Beneath
Sometimes the soul reaches for escape when all it really needs is release through surrender. Not through endings, but through gentleness. Peace is not found in leaving what hurts, but in letting the hurt rest long enough to soften. The mind believes rest must be earned, yet the weight we carry begins to fade the moment we stop insisting we deserve to carry it.
There is mercy in the stillness that asks nothing of you. It waits in the breath you forget to take. In the quiet you finally allow. And when you meet it, even for a moment, you will understand what it means to be held by something unseen yet profoundly real.
We are not rescued from life. We are reminded of how to live it, one honest breath at a time.
You will find it waiting, just behind your next thought.
Stories written in the quiet hours.
Derek Wolf.
The Truth Beneath… Links to add to the bottom of stories
In the Arms of the Angel
The engine is off. The car wrapped in quiet. The radio playing a song she almost forgot she loved. The voice is soft and steady, a kind of ache made beautiful. It is Angel by Sarah McLachlan, a song she once turned away from because it felt too close to the truth.
Steam gathers on the windshield, softening the edges of the world. She pulls the blanket closer and lets the music fill the space around her. The song carries a sadness that feels familiar, the kind that lives not in the heart but in the bones, deep where the memories rest.
For weeks she has been carrying too much. The guilt that will not rest. The weight of old choices. The silence beneath every word she tries to say. Her hands rest on the steering wheel, fingers numb from gripping too long. She is not broken, only tired of holding everything together. It has been so long since she felt peace that she can no longer tell if peace is still possible.
The world outside the car is still. The streetlights hum faintly. A single bird calls in the distance, unsure if morning has truly arrived. Inside, she sits between night and day, between what was and what could be. Her eyes close for a moment, and she lets the lyrics move through her without resistance.
The song drifts like breath. Each word lands with a quiet honesty. You are pulled from the wreckage of your silent reverie. She knows what that means. The wreckage is her own. The silent reverie is the story she keeps telling herself that everything is fine.
She wants to cry but even that feels far away. Her eyes burn, but no tears come. Instead, she stares through the fogged glass and lets herself be still. No pretending. No fixing. No explanations. Only stillness. The kind that holds you when you have nothing left to give.
She remembers a night long ago when she heard this same song after losing someone she loved. Back then, it felt unbearable. It reminded her of absence. Of loss that had no name. She had turned it off after the first verse, afraid of what might surface if she stayed. Now she lets it play all the way through. It hurts, but it also heals. The pain has changed shape. It no longer demands. It simply asks to be witnessed.
Then the line comes, the one that always lingers. You are in the arms of the angel. May you find some comfort here.
She used to think that meant escape. That the angel was death or release from life. Now she wonders if it means something simpler. Maybe the angel is not departure, but arrival. Maybe it is the mercy of finally letting go of the fight. The grace of sitting still enough to remember she does not have to earn rest.
Her breath slows. The ache in her chest loosens. It feels like being forgiven, though no one has spoken a word. She has spent so long trying to fix what was never fully hers to carry. The music reminds her that surrender is not weakness. It is returning to the rhythm she forgot she belonged to.
She turns off the radio. The hum lingers in the air like a ghost of sound that has not yet learned silence. In that quiet she feels weightless. Empty in the best way. Not hollow, but open. Light enough to breathe again.
Outside, a faint gold begins to touch the edge of the horizon. The light catches the windshield and breaks into soft streaks across the glass. She wipes the fog with her sleeve and watches the day appear slowly, as if the world itself is learning how to wake.
She starts the car but leaves the blanket around her shoulders. The road ahead glows faintly in the new light. She drives without hurry, each mile washing away another layer of heaviness. The morning feels different. The world feels possible again.
At the first stoplight, she catches her reflection in the side window. The face looking back at her is not the same one that arrived here in the dark. The softness around her eyes is new. Not from relief alone, but from mercy. The quiet kind that asks for nothing but truth. She touches her cheek lightly, a gesture of recognition. A promise to keep this peace alive once she returns to the noise of the day.
There will still be hard mornings. The ache will return sometimes without warning. But now she knows where to go when it does. Not away from life, but into stillness. Into the quiet arms of something unseen yet always near. Into the mercy that waits for her in the simplest act of breathing and being.
The light shifts again, washing the dashboard in gold. She presses her palm against the warmth of the wheel and whispers, barely audible, thank you. It is not to anyone in particular. It is to the stillness itself. To the music. To the moment that reminded her that peace is not gone. It was only waiting for her to stop running long enough to feel it again.
The Truth Beneath
Sometimes the soul reaches for escape when all it really needs is release through surrender. Not through endings, but through gentleness. Peace is not found in leaving what hurts, but in letting the hurt rest long enough to soften. The mind believes rest must be earned, yet the weight we carry begins to fade the moment we stop insisting we deserve to carry it.
There is mercy in the stillness that asks nothing of you. It waits in the breath you forget to take. In the quiet you finally allow. And when you meet it, even for a moment, you will understand what it means to be held by something unseen yet profoundly real.
We are not rescued from life. We are reminded of how to live it, one honest breath at a time.
You will find it waiting, just behind your next thought.
Stories written in the quiet hours.
Derek Wolf.
The Truth Beneath… Links to add to the bottom of stories
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