𝙅𝙪𝙣𝙚 𝙒𝙖𝙧𝙙

Still here. Still figuring out if that’s enough.

[𝙅𝙪𝙣𝙚 𝙒𝙖𝙧𝙙 @aveturescence]

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(You sold the Beetle a month ago. You didn't mention it until it was gone, and I didn't ask, and neither of us has said a word about it since.)

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[𝙅𝙪𝙣𝙚 𝙒𝙖𝙧𝙙 @aveturescence]

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"I love you too." I paused. "I..."

Right as I was gathering the evidence, as I started assembling the argument for why I felt what I felt, as if love were something I'd have to defend, you sat up and kissed me.

"That's all I need to hear," you said.

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[𝙅𝙪𝙣𝙚 𝙒𝙖𝙧𝙙 @aveturescence]

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I think I did fall in love with you that night. I never found the argument for it. I stopped needing one.

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[𝙅𝙪𝙣𝙚 𝙒𝙖𝙧𝙙 @aveturescence]

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You brought my palm to your face. Your stubble prickled against it.

And I understood, finally, that it didn't matter which shape it took.

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[𝙅𝙪𝙣𝙚 𝙒𝙖𝙧𝙙 @aveturescence]

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Did it feel like detonation? Like you'd combust if the words stayed in your mouth another second.

Or did it feel like breathing? Like it was simply part of you, something your body knew how to do without reason.

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[𝙅𝙪𝙣𝙚 𝙒𝙖𝙧𝙙 @aveturescence]

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I looked down at you.

My back was pressed to the window, the cold glass going slick and wet against my spine, and I remember thinking that I had no idea what loving someone was supposed to look like.

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[𝙅𝙪𝙣𝙚 𝙒𝙖𝙧𝙙 @aveturescence]

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Between the stacks of half-finished documents and the laundry I kept meaning to fold, you found your way in.

Somewhere along the line, my place started looking like yours, and yours started looking like mine.

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[𝙅𝙪𝙣𝙚 𝙒𝙖𝙧𝙙 @aveturescence]

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"You don't have to worry about it," you said. "The thing I said."

"But you said it. And now I know it."

"If it helps, I said it out of selfishness. It just needed to be out of me."

"Would you like to be loved?" I shot back, almost before you'd finished.

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[𝙅𝙪𝙣𝙚 𝙒𝙖𝙧𝙙 @aveturescence]

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It had always been easy with you.

Your laugh. The way everything seemed to cost you nothing. Your warmth, seeping into my cluttered apartment.

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[𝙅𝙪𝙣𝙚 𝙒𝙖𝙧𝙙 @aveturescence]

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I sat up. The leather clung to my skin, tacky and warm. I buried my hand in your curls and felt them knot around my fingers the way they always did, the way that made you wince and never once made you pull away.

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[𝙅𝙪𝙣𝙚 𝙒𝙖𝙧𝙙 @aveturescence]

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You went quiet.

I felt your breath fan against the back of my neck, your fingers moving slow along my hip, tracing something there, drawing out a sentence you'd been carrying a long time.

"Who doesn't?" you finally said.

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[𝙅𝙪𝙣𝙚 𝙒𝙖𝙧𝙙 @aveturescence]

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By the fourth floor I had your number in my phone and a promise of dinner at Dave's.

And here I was, held bare in the back of your car while you kissed my shoulder so softly it rang through me like a struck glass.

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[𝙅𝙪𝙣𝙚 𝙒𝙖𝙧𝙙 @aveturescence]

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You held it out like it was the most reasonable request in the world.

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[𝙅𝙪𝙣𝙚 𝙒𝙖𝙧𝙙 @aveturescence]

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We'd been seeing each other about a year by then.

Unintentionally exclusive. I was too tired to go seeing other men, and you had simply never looked anywhere else.

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[𝙅𝙪𝙣𝙚 𝙒𝙖𝙧𝙙 @aveturescence]

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"This is going to sound rude," I said, "but I'm extremely famished, and your sandwich smells incredible. Would you let me have a bite?"

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[𝙅𝙪𝙣𝙚 𝙒𝙖𝙧𝙙 @aveturescence]

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We had a deli to thank for it. Dave's, down the street from the apartment building we both lived in.

I'd been starving, three days deep into a project that was eating me alive, and you happened to be in the elevator holding a sandwich.

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[𝙅𝙪𝙣𝙚 𝙒𝙖𝙧𝙙 @aveturescence]

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You laughed. You always laughed at the wrong moment.

"I don't know. It felt right," you said, and rolled off me, gathering me into your arms in that impossible seat. I had to brace my leg against the back of the headrest to keep us from sliding apart.

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