She would tell me about the times
she went through with things
because the cost of no
was something she already knew.
Had already paid.
In ways that left a mark
long before I arrived.
And I held that.
Let it live in me
the way these things do
when you care enough
to really listen.
And now she is gone
and I am here
and a woman is asking for my number.
Touching me.
Looking at me so deeply
I can feel it
before I can think it —
her whole body and mind and soul in it —
and something shifts in my chest.
I know this woman.
I can see her —
really see her —
certain and present
and exactly where she wants to be.
And I still pull back.
Because knowing isn't the problem.
It never was.
It's that the knowing
has to fight its way through
something that lives
beneath knowing —
rising up in every moment
of being wanted,
every smile,
every hand on my arm,
every pair of eyes
that hold mine a beat too long.
The ghost of every woman
who said yes
because no
had consequences
she couldn't bear again.
And so I pull back.
And she looks at me
with that puzzled expression —
and then the question
that breaks something in me:
what's wrong with me?
Nothing.
God, nothing.
You are certain and bright
and exactly what you appear to be
and I can see all of it
and I still —
I cannot explain
that I am not pulling back from her.
I am pulling back from something
she can't see,
something that was never her story
to carry.
That was never mine either.
And yet.
Here I am.
Standing at the edge
of something real and freely given,
watching a woman
wonder what she did wrong —
still carrying a pain
that wasn't mine to keep
and not knowing
how to put it down.