touch

do you remember that day in the early springtime, before things thawed out, really, it was drizzly and we went to new hampshire? remember how i walked calmly down to the woods, and you warned me there were ticks, to be careful, and i wore my scarf like a hijab?

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it was a thursday. that's for sure. our laughs ringing out in staccato bursts, me first, then you. you said i had a great laugh. i don't take compliments well. i never know what to say, i always want to make excuses. they say that's the most ungrateful thing to do.

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what about that jacket i had, all new age-y, that dusty blue color, with the slightly flared sleeves? i think it was from some yoga place but i wore it all the time. my board straight, sun-kissed hair. our thin and limber high school selves, leaning on that brick wall outside the cafeteria.

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i knew the moment i went into that apartment that i'd be completely unable to resist. it was all wrong, though. i didn't sleep at all that night, we talked the whole time. i showered at 4a and then we left you there, and we drove nonstop to chicago.

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i used to fall asleep to the sound of the pen marking dissertations, the thin, sharp marks. the kind you always made. you never remembered where you put your watch. it's not yours anymore.

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what about all those favors? i don't regret anything. but i don't know why i felt i owed you anything. i didn't. i'm just a sucker for hard luck cases.

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what if i told you the truth? but the truth isn't retroactive, truth changes. what was true then isn't true anymore. and i've left some stories out. sometimes in retrospect things don't seem as important. life has a way of contextualizing.

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but this isn't about you, singular. you are a collective. you are only one person in one moment, but many over a span of time. you, you, you. all different, a gradient scale, from one end of the spectrum to another.

and when i say, i miss fort worth: i miss home. but home is the wrong word, no the right word, but not the honest one.