An Unedited Answer To When You Ask, ‘Do You Even Like Me?’

No. No, I don’t “even like you.”

Because to put it in those terms would be too simple. To say that I just “even like you” would be like saying constellations are just unimportant accidents. No, that’s not it either. Because technically Gemini is an accident, Cassiopeia is an accident, Andromeda and the dippers and the belt along Orion is an accident. They were not placed there with purpose, they just happened and now they form whatever “they” are. And I suppose, in a way, we just happened. We collided and combusted and settled and were and are becoming whatever “we” are. But no, no I don’t just like you. I am endlessly fascinated by you. I could fill textbooks and teach a class on all of the things you do to me that make me utterly transfixed. And trust me, I would never say the word “transfixed” to your face because I can already predict the reaction I would get. Don’t worry, I’m giving it to myself and then some. But the fact of the matter is it’s bigger than infatuation. It’s bigger than crush. It’s bigger than like. So no. No, I don’t “even like you.” It’s something with more fortitude. It’s something that I can feel pulsating at my core repeating This matters, this matters a lot over and over and over again. It’s something more than happenstance or a fling or whatever word we don’t assign to whatever “us” is. To say that I just “even like you” would be like saying constellations are insignificant.

And if I wouldn’t say that about something that happens to envelop the entire night sky, I wouldn’t say it about you either.