the old hunt
it starts easy.
he sees her across a room,
across a screen,
across whatever distance men have always crossed
to get themselves into trouble.
he carries the conversation on his back.
she smiles.
he feels chosen because she said yes.
she feels chosen because he asked.
for a while,
the math works.
every mile he walks toward her
comes back as meaning.
then years happen.
the hunt ends.
or at least he thinks it does.
she doesn't.
she still wants pursuit.
still wants proof.
because once a woman has been chosen,
being chosen again is the thing she misses.
and he misses something too.
he misses being wanted
without having to earn it every goddamn day.
he misses someone noticing
the weight he carries
before asking him to carry more.
so she says he's become distant.
he says nothing.
because men learn early
that nobody gives a shit about their hunger,
only whether they keep hunting.
then one day
someone laughs at his joke.
remembers his name.
notices the thing
his wife stopped seeing years ago.
and suddenly
he feels real again.
not loved.
just seen.
somewhere else,
a man pays attention to a woman
whose husband has mistaken familiarity for affection.
he asks questions.
he listens.
he pursues.
and she remembers
what it felt like
to be chosen.
people call it lust.
sometimes it is.
but most affairs begin smaller than that.
the ugly truth is
most people aren't looking for sex.
they're looking for evidence.
evidence they still matter.
evidence their efforts land.
if men learned to find some of that proof in themselves,
if women learned that love is not only receiving pursuit but returning it,
if both stopped treating their own needs as sacred
and the other's as optional,
maybe fewer people would wake up next to strangers
wondering where the person they married went.
the cruel joke is
they're usually still there.
waiting to be chosen too.
@ok_bishh I've been so lucky. I rent in OKC and I've gone from 900/month to 1000 from 2020 to now. My landlord has been awesome and fixed any problem I had in less than a day. I fixed any small problems.