gentlygenesis

[gentlygenesis]

it’s national esex day

thanks buddy

so actually the wife and i earlier

[gentlygenesis]

I am allowed to touch you again.

Not in front of our friends, still, but in the privacy and silence of our separate rooms. We exchange fleeting touches out of the gaze of our mutual friend group. They do not know that I know nearly every inch of your body, the way you feel under our lab uniforms. They do not know I know what you sound like in your most private moments, your most vulnerable states.

I know your body almost better than I know mine, and I still feel easily replaced. I feel as though I could be dropped and discarded and sent back to our original standings of acquaintances. You are the sun, the moon, and the stars, and I am merely the dust lying on your surface.

But I am allowed to touch you again.

[gentlygenesis]

Why do I wake up so devastated in your absence, knowing that I cannot have you and I could never have you?

[gentlygenesis]

The way she looks at me conflicts the way that I know she tries to express she feels. She stares at me, lying beside me in my bed, and there is nothing but adoration in her gaze. I smile and she smiles back. I have to look away.

"Why'd you turn?" She asks, and her voice is soft. Knowing.

"Nothin'." I answer, trying to sound calm. She hears right through it.

"Hmmmm," she hums in response, and I hum back at her just the same.

"It's the way you look at me," I say. "It always is."

"Oh," her voice is softer, almost. Impossibly. She sounds surprised. "I'm sorry."

"No, it's okay. Don't apologize." I swallow, turning my head back to look at her once again. She is still looking at me the same, still half-smiling. My head is swimming.

She is everything that I think I have ever wanted, will ever want. I miss her, and she is right next to me. But she sees me in the way that I am not sure I want, in a way that resembles an incredibly strong friendship. I do not want to date her, I do not want a relationship with her, but at the same time, I do not want her to date anyone else. Or, really, if she asked to date me, I would probably say yes.

[gentlygenesis]

"No secrets," we agree. I nod along to your words, trying to stay stoic. I hope that my expression does not falter, does not expose my dishonesty.

"Of course not," I answer, lacing my voice with what I pray is enough sincerity. You smile, and I know I have fooled you, and my stomach turns. I am not proud of myself for lying.

I know that I must lie to protect our relationship. You do not realize this, but I will think about it forever. I will tell you that I harbor no secrets, that I am incapable of keeping things from someone like you. I will tell you that you know me at my truest and most open. I will not mean it. You will think I do.

[gentlygenesis]

I have always been afraid of the dark. There is something about not knowing what might emerge from the silent corners of your room that forces your mind to create an omnipresent nagging fear. I am not afraid now, though, walking into the silent woods. I have an exam in the morning. She is studying, ever busy and ever anxious. I should be anxious; the woods are scary and it is raining. But I am not. The woods are just trees, and the rain is just water. We are just friends, and I am not in love with her.

[gentlygenesis]

"I hope you're not expecting a relationship."

I let mock disgust blanket my face to hide the fact that my heart just squeezed so painfully I wonder if it skipped a beat or four.

"Oh, God, no," I reply. My stomach flips, twists, lurches. I laugh a little in spite of it. "No, dude. I don't expect any of that from you. Especially not right now."

You nod, turn back to our task at hand. We are surrounded by our friends, yet secluded, always together. "Okay. I just need a month, minimum, before I even think about a relationship like that again."

In a way, you are almost making it sound like I could still have a chance. I know you are not. Regardless, the idea of that makes me more nauseous, makes me want to turn and run and get sick in the grass alone. I am trying to get over you. "No problem, seriously. I don't expect anything like that from you. I never have."

You smile, nod again. "Okay. Thank God, I was worried. I'm glad you get it." You give me a look that is so soft and so fond, I wish I could sink into the ground. "You always get it."

I will always get it. Even if I do not, I will lie, and I will tell you exactly what you want to hear, so that I may remain the most favorable version of myself for you. I want to see you happy, and I will break myself down over and over again just to see you smile. I only want the best for you, and the best is not me, so I will support you.

You mention someone that you are interested in. You ask me if I think that you have a chance, and your eyes are so anxious and desperate that I couldn't tell you anything other than what you are searching for. I smile, nod, pat your arm. I tell you yes, I think you have the best chance, and everything will go great. I do not tell you that I wish you were asking it about me.

[gentlygenesis]

"-and I really think they might like me too!" There's joy in your voice, elation of a heart so kind and so trusting that I can't help but smile too. I nod along to your words, hoping that I come across as happy for you. Really, I'm trying to tamp down my feelings. I am fighting against my emotions, fighting against the way my chest burns knowing that you won't spend as much time with me anymore. I know it is a tactless and insensitive thought, something dripping with selfishness and jealousy.

Foolishly, and briefly, I wish I had you only to myself. I wish that I was the only one to see you in your purest form. I know I am not the only one to have seen certain sides of you, but I wish that I was. I wish that you longed for me the way that I long for you. The acceptance that you are not mine, and you have not been mine, is one that will take a few more weeks to roll around. In the meantime, I will still dwell on the thoughts that echo around my head and whisper that you could have been mine.

[gentlygenesis]

Cupidity.

It means a strong desire, and it describes every way I have ever felt about her. The cupidity I feel towards her could assemble a small army, storm the lives of anyone who has ever made her upset. The cupidity of my soul weighs me down, trips me over the words I so desperately hide behind. Cupidity pushes me down and spits on my face, steps on my chest, reminds me of what I cannot have.

[gentlygenesis]

“However rare true love may be, it is less so than true friendship.”

— François de la Rochefoucauld

[gentlygenesis]

"Too funny," you tell me. You find me too funny, and you have to stop laughing so hard at everything I say. I laugh with you, brushing it off, and I pretend like I do not understand the implications. I pretend that I do not know you are suggesting that you are going to fall in love with me. I protect my peace with you, although I know that you are my peace, and I act like I am not already in love with you. I am not allowed to be in love with you, nor am I allowed to wish that you would be in love with me too.

[gentlygenesis]

I tell you that I love you, and I have never meant it so much. I mean it in a way that is so deep and raw and true to my soul that it terrifies me. I say it, and I feel it in every nerve in my body, in each and every blood cell that leaves my heart and circulates through my being. I have never loved anyone as much as I love you. I will never love anyone as much as I love you.

[gentlygenesis]

She reminisces on the memories of the relationship that she lost. She gently kissed their years together on the forehead and sent it off to sea to sail away in a different direction and never be seen again. She remembers the things that she will never see with him again, the words that will be left unsaid and the touches that will be left unfelt. She dwells on her memories, dances around them in the palace that is her mind, but she is ready to leave them behind. She no longer craves commitment, does not want to be romanticized.

I reminisce, but it is on the memories of her. My fingers ghost over the bruises left in lust and my heart squeezes in a familiar way that I know it should not. I know this, because it means more than I am prepared to face. My chest aches, tightens, burns, and I know that I am in love with her. I know that I will never be able to act upon it. I know I am not what she needs, nor craves, although she may want. For the first time as an adult, I crave commitment. I long to be romanticized.

[gentlygenesis]

Selfishly, I can't help but wonder if things would have gone differently if I wasn't who I am. Maybe, and the thought briefly horrifies me, if I was someone who was born as a boy, it would have been different. I wonder if she still thinks about the way that I think of her - occupying every last corner inch of my mind until I feel so suffocated that I have to gasp for a breath that otherwise would have been insignificant. I wonder if she thinks about me when she does her mindless tasks in the morning, the way that I think about her in the silence when I brush my teeth. I wonder if the smallest things send a jolt down her spine and a brief flashback that makes her need to hold onto something to be steadied once more. I look at my mirror, and I can almost see her standing beside me, my arm around her waist and my hand on her hip and her head on my shoulder. I almost see her in my comfortable chair, the new one that my father's mother just bought me as a Christmas present in March. I almost see the way we both avoided eye contact and the silence that wore us thin, the one that made us question if this was the end of everything. I almost see her in my desk chair, tying her shoes and giggling at something stupid that I'd already said four times prior, but still holds its sacred hilarity. Most of all, I can almost see her in my bed, curled up on her side under my favorite blanket, her head on the pillow I spent five minutes choosing in Walmart with my mom. I almost see her holding on to the massive shark plushie that I got on sale last Valentine's Day, its stuffing mushed and lumpy and misshapen by love. But she is not there. She is not standing by me in front of my mirror, she is not in my comfortable chair, or my desk chair, or my bed. We are best friends, just like before, and that is all. I wish I would've kissed her one last time.