Confessions · Open Letter
this is the quiet version
the one i don’t say out loud
when you’re standing in front of me
trying to fix it
you lean in like you’ve found the right words
“at least”
and i feel myself step back
not visibly
just enough that you’ll never notice
because what you’re really saying is
let me make this smaller so i can hold it
and what i’m feeling is honestly…
please don’t
you don’t see the shift
how i start editing myself mid conversation
how i nod sooner than i mean to
how i swallow the parts that don’t fit inside your version
you leave thinking you met me where i was, thinking i think you met me where i was,
i leave knowing i moved
that’s what “at least” does here
it doesn’t comfort me
it teaches me how to disappear a little cleaner
how to round off the edges of what i’m saying
so you don’t have to sit with anything sharp
and i know you’re trying
i can feel that
this isn’t me dragging you for it
it’s just, intimacy doesn’t live in the reframe
it lives in the pause, the one where you almost say something
and then don’t
it lives in the eye contact that holds
even when there’s nothing tidy to offer
it lives in letting me be exactly as i am
without asking me to translate it
into something easier to understand
so when i don’t open up the same way next time, or when i continue to keep things a little closer to my chest
it’s not distance for the sake of it
it’s memory
it’s my body remembering
what happens when i hand something over
and it comes back reshaped
i’m not asking for perfect words
i’m asking for less of them
less fixing
less softening
less at least
just stay where i am for a second
don’t move it
don’t name it
just this time…
don’t make me leave it alone