Fear with a Better Vocabulary
on loving stories about almost
I think I've figured out
why you're such a fan of stories about missed connections.
Almosts,
could haves.
The way you romanticize the almost-touch,
the almost-said,
the train that leaves just before someone decides
they're brave enough to run–
you call it timing.
You call it fate.
You call it beautiful.
But it's not beautiful.
It's hesitation dressed up as poetry.
Those stories don't end the way they do
because the world is cruel–
they end that way
because someone chose silence
when it mattered most.
Because someone felt everything
and still did nothing.
And you–
you sit there, consuming it like comfort food,
like proof that love isn't supposed to be held onto,
only almost held,
almost spoken,
almost survived.
Because "almost" doesn't ask anything of you.
Almost doesn't require courage.
Doesn't demand you risk being seen
in all your wanting,
your need,
your inconvenient depth.
Almost lets you walk away clean–
no rejection,
no failure,
just a quiet, self-inflicted haunting
you can blame on circumstance.
And I think that's why you love them.
Because you've built a life
on almosts.
You meet people
right up until the point
they might actually matter.
You feel things
right up until the moment
they might cost you something.
You date people
right up until the point
they ask something of you.
Then you retreat–
call it overwhelm,
call it bad timing,
call it anything but what it is:
fear with a better vocabulary.
Those movies you love?
They could've ended differently.
One sentence.
One step forward.
One moment of choosing courage
over comfort.
But they didn't–
because someone stayed seated
when they should've stood,
stayed quiet
when they should've broken open.
You don't love those stories
because they're tragic.
You love them
because they absolve you.
Because they whisper,
"see?
It's not your fault."
But it is.
Love...real love...
isn't found in almosts.
It lives in the terrifying, irreversible act
of saying it,
choosing it,
staying when it gets heavy
and stops being cinematic.
And you–
you'd rather watch the ending
than risk changing it.
About the Creator
E.S.Flint
I’m an Indigenous storyteller using poetry, photography & fiction to explore identity, love, loss and all the spaces we return to.
What I can't say, I write or capture. Because feeling it all is the point.
Follow me on Instgram: es.flint
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