Here comes the sun.
Though I dare not speak of it.
So I cannot or… I haven’t been able to speak of it.

But my insides are expanding a mile a minute and have been doing so for weeks and weeks now. I’ve wanted to say something. Anything. But not here. No more exposition about aspects of a frame of thought that doesn’t matter anymore. What matters is what I’m living and feeling.

I wondered if it could ever be like this.

It is.

I am not your pet project.

Parting from a quick visit with an old work mate, Ava continues to her destination…

…and has to physically stop herself from dancing throughout her day.

“It’s not presumptuous. It’s prepared,” he replied, grinning out of the corner of his mouth as he drove them to her destination. “You started it anyway,” he just had to add.

And she did just have to start it again, when she had, a scant hour earlier let her face fall into her hands and declared that she was, “thinking evil thoughts.”

He hadn’t hesitated then. Hand slipped over her jeaned thigh and ended up entwined with her own eager grasp.

They breathed about their last encounter a month prior. Unspoken other than within her stories and combined daydreams.

Within the red candlelit sphere of their table and music mingled unmasking they made eye contact.

He kissed her. And she had no doubt where they’d end up again.

So it was no surprise now that they spoke more openly about their situation. They’d already been here once, twice, so many times before. “It’s something more than friendship. There’s friendship. But there’s something else.” She didn’t dare speculate what that else he spoke of was.

She tried not to speculate anymore. Because she didn’t have anything to build from except the haze they entertained. Which said so much and not much.

Except a delicious unveiling and departure from pressed up against her kitchen counter to the comfort of familiar sheets.

He, naked.
Her, entwined in black lace and purple ribbon.

Delicate edge and fringe
benefits.

The anticipation that held moments up until then
Engendered focus

Fluid-ly

She didn’t recall falling asleep more than an hour and a half, or so, later.

But she did remember mumbling to him, “you had better be setting that for earlier than normal,” as he keyed in his morning alarm.
“It’s set for 6:15, but I don’t need to leave until 6:45,” was his reply.

She woke up to him guiding her hand and then returning her sleepy favour, a full half hour before 6:15 was to roll around.

Afterwards she dozed in and out of sleep, but ultimately remained awake after he left her with a kiss to the forehead and lips.

She was unaccustomed to sleeping beside someone again. And she was sure she would remain so.

Avis hesitated slightly when she saw who was calling. But, true to form, she accepts.

“Hello?”
“Hi Avis.”
“Hi J1. How are you?”

The conversation took an immediate turn for reasons.

“So I need to explain why I didn’t return your call a while back.”
“Okay?”

Unloading unveiled. Avis sits on her bed and halted breath and life for the time he talked.

“You still there?”
“Yea?”
“What I’m saying is…”

Avis breathed renewed relief and built-up anticipation. Even still… The situation gave her pause. He had crawled out from her resolve to tell her all after she’d resigned herself to being clear of him.

But she didn’t want to be clear of him. Even if they couldn’t be together, she wasn’t up for another five year absence. There was something about their familiarity she wasn’t prepared to give up.

“I wanted to talk to you. But I thought it would be too hard, pretending like everything was okay. Because I wasn’t okay.”
“I understand. Really.”

She did. And does. And will always try to understand.

And her relief was an incredible amount. Because this also showed her that he wasn’t the man she had worried he might be in the past few weeks of blackout.

She wasn’t wrong about him.

Hanging up she went back to her computer and picked music from the times and relaxed a little more as it enfolded her.

She could always fall back on her music.

Apology on repeat.
Raine rerun.

While she sat
Shoulders back
Legs crossed.

The game played itself out before her ambiguously green eyes.

Self-esteem.
Measured means.

-____ went from being “single” to “in a relationship.”-

Avis laughed herself to tears.

She lit a smoke and wondered if she’ll ever find the mystically happy medium between being stalked and being ignored.

She’d spent so much time spinning around in her swivel chairs.
One at work.
One at home.
Hoping for the best.

Maybe, under the sex and the words, there was something tangible.
Maybe, behind the beer and gin, there wasn’t disappointment.
Maybe, if she just pushed through the next few weeks, she wouldn’t hate her job anymore.

“Maybemaybemaybemaybe.”

Friday.
Her lunch break could not arrive fast enough. And the thought of returning afterward was unbearable.
It rained.
She walked
For most of her hour long lunch.
Vancouver blocks and fast traffic blurred bye.

Streets are so alluring.

She couldn’t live in anticipation for something better to happen anymore.

So she walks in a different direction.
Away.

Avis breathed a sigh of relief when she sat back down at her desk the following Monday. She stared out her window at the downtown Vancouver skyscape. Then beyond to the mountains. She remembered how she felt when she reached the peak of her first climb.

Quitting her job just moments before felt similar.