You Gave Me Something I’m Afraid To Lose

One night. One night was all it took for me to fall head over heels for you.

I’ve never felt so right about something or someone. I kept looking at you and wondering how we even got here.

I wonder if you felt it too.

Our food got cold from talking too much but we didn’t run out of things to say. Not once.

There was a comfort to silences that made them the least bit awkward.

It was stepping close to one another but nothing really happening other than my heart beating through my chest.

And cliché moments they write about became reality as you wiped the chocolate off my face and I smiled.

It was taking your hand and leading the way and I wondered if you felt mine shaking.

It was your arm around me like it was a middle school date but here we were adults.

It was leaning in for a kiss and I’ve kissed a lot of people before but with you it was like the right kiss.

And we talked over a movie I wasn’t even watching because in reality my eyes were on you.

You made me feel safe.

And all I wanted was for time to freeze. Because if I could just have that moment, that one night on replay whenever I chose, I’d be happy. I’d be secure. I’d be confident. There was a confidence looking into eyes that looked right back at me, and in the silence it said, “I won’t hurt you.”

Genuine words came out of your mouth and I actually believed them because there wasn’t a prior motive behind a compliment like I’m used to.

And my walls came crumbling down with your touch and I told you everything. There weren’t rules that applied to this date of what I should or shouldn’t say because with you no one in the past mattered. I looked at you and I saw what I wanted to be my future.

How does someone know something like that so quickly?

But with you it was easy.

But with all these feelings that rushed to me at once when we parted ways with a hug and a kiss I didn’t want to end. I knew looking at you leave at a normal hour I had something to lose.

I knew looking at my reflection with clothes still on and a body still sober you weren’t like the rest of them.

And flowers sat on the table that brought me tears when I was alone because they told me someone like you existed.

If we talked about my past you’d discover a list of names I wish I could forget and nights I don’t even remember.

But it was like I was drunk on you with no alcohol at all. I didn’t need to be. Because for the first time I needed anything to numb my pain because with you there wasn’t any.

I watched you go hoping that wouldn’t be the end.

Because in a single night I let you closer than any of them in the past.

So now here I am scared shitless of messing this thing up. I don’t even know what this is or if it’s anything.

And I look at my phone too often thinking maybe you’ll change your mind. Maybe I’ll overwhelm you. Maybe I’ll say too much or the wrong thing. Maybe I’ll try too hard. Maybe you’ll stop answering. Maybe you wake up and decide you can’t do this. Maybe again I’ll be blindsided. Maybe you’ll think I’m crazy. Maybe you’ll hate me for everything I’m not but I wish I could be.

But then the maybe I cling to, is maybe none of what I’ve come to learn is ‘normal’ in relationships will happen with you. Just maybe you are the exception.

But what I do know is I want you a part of my life. And I haven’t said that to anyone in a while. And it scares me. It scares me to admit that. It makes me feel weak saying I care. But I do.

You make me laugh and smile in a way I’m not faking it.

You make me want to remember everything and not drink to forget.

I went to bed crying that night, like all the pain had been flooded out of me. And my phone went off around 3am and for the first time I chose not to answer.

It was in you and in a single night I got what I’ve deserved this entire time of settling.

So even if this doesn’t work out, I find comfort in knowing someone like you exists in the world. Someone who in a single night taught despite a heart that’s black it still beats and I can still feel everything I’ve repressed and feared for so long.