“Don’t.” Mine is too. “Don’t you dare tell me that was nothing.”
“I know,” he says.
• • •
Quiet.
Certain.
Like that’s the whole problem.
He knows.
He’s always known.
And it doesn’t matter.
• • •
I look at him for a long moment.
This person I have loved since before I knew what love was.
Who came through my window on the worst night of his life.
Who sat on my kitchen floor and held my hand under the stars and said I need you so much like a confession he couldn’t take back.
Who just kissed me like it was the last time.
• • •
Maybe because he knew it was.
I can’t stay and watch him lock it back up.
Not after that.
Not after finally —
• • •
So I leave.
Before he can make me feel like I imagined it.
I didn’t imagine it.
I know I didn’t.
But the worst part — the part that will stay with me longer than the kiss —
is the way he said I know.
Like it changed nothing.
Like it was never going to.
I let him burn me again.
