A stolen kiss

I wasn’t sure if I dreamed this moment alive, but there was raw emotion in the way his hand disappeared between my back and carefully pulled me closer. He was very gentle in his touch, where he was more aggressive in the way he kissed me. I couldn’t help but keep my eyes half open, sneaking a guilty peek at him just to make sure that this wasn’t all a product of my imagination.

Was nature actually rooting for this moment to happen or was my mind just playing tricks on me again, projecting this perfect present? Whatever it was, one thing was clear to me, which was that for the first time in a long while I didn’t feel shy or uncertain. The warmth of his breath was destabilizing, yet inviting. I couldn’t help but drape both my arms around his neck, grabbing the back of his head and I pulled him in further.

As quickly as the moment happened, it stopped, startling me as I didn’t immediately realize what the look on this face meant. I got too comfortable and lost my focus. I let down my guard, without realizing the consequences and I could already tell that it would come back to bite me.

He looked at me for a moment, a penetrating stare that immediately made me regret drawing his attention. He wore melancholy like a cloak that couldn’t touch the floor and so he couldn’t help but hold on to it so tightly. It was written in the sadness behind his eyes, which held more stories than anyone really should. His cloak was like an anchor that kept him from moving forward and seeing the brightness, and instead, he lived continuously in his memories. Part of me wanted to rip it away, guiding him to the surface and replace his thoughts with ones that didn’t weigh so heavy. Part of me wished it could be that easy, but in reality, I knew that certain things were hard to come back from.

“I’m sorry,” he said with a voice that didn’t seem like his own, almost stumbling over the words, like he wasn’t sure how to use them. He turned around so fast that it almost seemed like I made the whole scene up in my mind. I let my eyes stray down to my side, not thinking about the way his hand felt when he brushed past it, but about my own secrets that I have been trying to keep from entering the world. I stared back ahead to the dark space in front of me now, barely making out the shape of someone that was once here, and found myself just standing there with my fingers against my lower lip, remembering.

“Even broken crayons can still color.” With nothing left to find in the dark, I turned around and made my way inside the house, erasing the moment by the time I closed the door behind me.

* * *

The world outside was teasing me with its silence; everyone and everything slept, but my mind just couldn’t find any rest. I noticed how frost had grown over the windows while I pulled the blankets to my chin as a chill went down my spine. I watched the ice crystals grow for a while, allowing my brain to be empty and content to just exist and be. I was never one to cope with stress in the best way.

Time kind of got away from me and the only proof and confirmation I got of it were from the numbers on my bedside alarm clock. Finding rest in my mind seemed impossible as it constantly kept regurgitating the worries I was coping with, the worries that would come the next day, and the worries about how I was going to face anyone ever again.