Published in Zodiac Review
The screams of the blue jays cut the respectful silence, calling from the branches above me. Not a single bowed head turns to look.
It would mean looking at me.
You’d always promised it could end this way. In those quiet whispers in the hollow of night. I’d thought it an idle threat, a misplaced compliment. An attempt to flatter me.
At first your obsessive jealousy gave me legs to stand on, if not stand up. Knowing I was worth such desperate love. Worth two a.m. phone calls, frantic verification of my whereabouts. Worth a compressed hiss, a tug of my sleeve demanding attention should my gaze linger elsewhere.
Someone you couldn’t live without.
Your words built me. Piece by piece. This beautiful girl, wild and desirable, the object of every man’s fantasies, wanted me. Me. You made me.
Soft words float across the lawn. A practiced baritone soothing, rounding the edges of sharp pain in downcast eyes. I can’t understand what he says from my place in the periphery, the row of trees between green grass and barren field.
Your whisper might have made me. But it couldn’t keep me.
An inspired moment, my random comment becomes conversation, a brief interlude in Starbucks extended to lingering sips at a tall, unsteady table. More conversation. An exchange of numbers. Four days later, I’d called her. Three minutes became an hour, a promise to meet again. More coffee. More hours.
A hot breath of wind stirs the dust from the fields. Catches in my eyes.
You found her text messages on my phone left sitting on the counter. You can’t love her, you spat at me. Erupted in a flurry of nails and wild, reflexive punches and accusations.
I agreed. Said I’d been led astray, succumbed to an over-active libido. Sweet sweat and desperate breath. I’d confused lust with love.
And I had. The way you dressed, smiled, walked, lithe and limber, straight shouldered with a spring in the arch of your back, demanding my attention, my hands, my devotion. The way you’d dragged me into the dressing room, thrown me against a wall, yourself across me with a flurry of roving fingers and desperate kisses. Confusing your need as love. My need as love.
So easy to fall into. A connection made, skin to skin, the intimacy of proximity.
So hard to escape.
A respectful silence follows his final word. An occasional sniff, a shuffle of feet or tug at a tie in the heat. Heads bowed.
My secret grew.
A Sunday afternoon, casual conversation in the park, soft spring sun and open book across her lap. Chance encounter after a Thursday morning jog, a quick smile, a few words. Perhaps ten minutes as the world woke and the birds found their voices.
Then you followed me. When you were supposed to be behind the bar, listening to life stories and clumsy attempts at flirtation, garnering looks and excessive tips with the flutter of dark lashes and careful, brief flashes of cleavage. Instead you slunk in the dark, back streets and alleys, my shadow, watched our briefest of embraces before she stepped into her car.
You fucked her! Screamed in the hollow of night, my neighbors’ lights answering the pounding on my front door.
I opened it to your wild, dark eyes. You waited, body tensed, hands ready to release in a flurry of wild, ineffective swings and accusations. A slight breeze cooled the air, pushed wayward bangs across your eyes. My answer hovered, balanced on my tongue.
I stood on the threshold; saw nothing but the peeling paint at my feet as my whisper escaped. Yes. Yes, I did.
You made good on your promise.
The earth swallows you. People turn, dazed, file slowly away. The sun sculpts beads of sticky sweat down the back of my neck. You deserved better. Better than this.
I never touched her.
It would mean looking at me.
You’d always promised it could end this way. In those quiet whispers in the hollow of night. I’d thought it an idle threat, a misplaced compliment. An attempt to flatter me.
At first your obsessive jealousy gave me legs to stand on, if not stand up. Knowing I was worth such desperate love. Worth two a.m. phone calls, frantic verification of my whereabouts. Worth a compressed hiss, a tug of my sleeve demanding attention should my gaze linger elsewhere.
Someone you couldn’t live without.
Your words built me. Piece by piece. This beautiful girl, wild and desirable, the object of every man’s fantasies, wanted me. Me. You made me.
Soft words float across the lawn. A practiced baritone soothing, rounding the edges of sharp pain in downcast eyes. I can’t understand what he says from my place in the periphery, the row of trees between green grass and barren field.
Your whisper might have made me. But it couldn’t keep me.
An inspired moment, my random comment becomes conversation, a brief interlude in Starbucks extended to lingering sips at a tall, unsteady table. More conversation. An exchange of numbers. Four days later, I’d called her. Three minutes became an hour, a promise to meet again. More coffee. More hours.
A hot breath of wind stirs the dust from the fields. Catches in my eyes.
You found her text messages on my phone left sitting on the counter. You can’t love her, you spat at me. Erupted in a flurry of nails and wild, reflexive punches and accusations.
I agreed. Said I’d been led astray, succumbed to an over-active libido. Sweet sweat and desperate breath. I’d confused lust with love.
And I had. The way you dressed, smiled, walked, lithe and limber, straight shouldered with a spring in the arch of your back, demanding my attention, my hands, my devotion. The way you’d dragged me into the dressing room, thrown me against a wall, yourself across me with a flurry of roving fingers and desperate kisses. Confusing your need as love. My need as love.
So easy to fall into. A connection made, skin to skin, the intimacy of proximity.
So hard to escape.
A respectful silence follows his final word. An occasional sniff, a shuffle of feet or tug at a tie in the heat. Heads bowed.
My secret grew.
A Sunday afternoon, casual conversation in the park, soft spring sun and open book across her lap. Chance encounter after a Thursday morning jog, a quick smile, a few words. Perhaps ten minutes as the world woke and the birds found their voices.
Then you followed me. When you were supposed to be behind the bar, listening to life stories and clumsy attempts at flirtation, garnering looks and excessive tips with the flutter of dark lashes and careful, brief flashes of cleavage. Instead you slunk in the dark, back streets and alleys, my shadow, watched our briefest of embraces before she stepped into her car.
You fucked her! Screamed in the hollow of night, my neighbors’ lights answering the pounding on my front door.
I opened it to your wild, dark eyes. You waited, body tensed, hands ready to release in a flurry of wild, ineffective swings and accusations. A slight breeze cooled the air, pushed wayward bangs across your eyes. My answer hovered, balanced on my tongue.
I stood on the threshold; saw nothing but the peeling paint at my feet as my whisper escaped. Yes. Yes, I did.
You made good on your promise.
The earth swallows you. People turn, dazed, file slowly away. The sun sculpts beads of sticky sweat down the back of my neck. You deserved better. Better than this.
I never touched her.