A Sneak Peek at Iman's Little Blog Part 2

     Iman’s Little Apology

1/28/2023

 I had 12  minutes to lower my heart rate and stop sweating before $@719 arrived. I couldn't have him thinking I was stressed about his arrival, so I poured myself a glass of wine, opened my computer, and turned on my TV. Very, very casual. I honestly didn't have anything prepared to say, I hadn't expected Kafia to text him and the last I'd checked, he had my cell number blocked. I wondered if he'd actually  unblocked me or if the Love Witch had cast a spell on his phone…either way, he was on his way and I still didn't have anything worth saying. Now, with only 7 minutes to spare, I began typing out cool opening sentences. 

1. You look nice. 

2. Thanks for coming, I appreciate you making the time. 

3. Sorry I'm insane. 

4. Sorry, I'm insane…

5. If you hate me so much that you needed to ignore me for 8 months why are you even here? 

None of them felt right. What if he didn't look nice? What if he said he didn't actually want to make time for me, but did because I'm so annoying? What if he didn't argue with me to say I'm not insane? 

I took a big gulp of my Pinot Noir. I'd really set myself up to fail. I typed “how to talk to a man that you made hate you” into Google. Reddit looked pretty promising, but I didn't know how to use it. I tried a new search. “How to tell a man that you only acted insane because he forced you to have feelings for him.” Nothing really came up. Defeated, I pulled up Girls Go Games to pass the time. 

I was in the middle of giving Barbie a makeover when I heard a knock at my door and saw a text from $@719 saying “I'm here.” I considered turning off the lights and pretending not to be home, but they would have been silly. Nervous, I looked at my list of responses and decided on “you look nice”. Then I garnered up all my courage, took another gulp of wine, and walked to my front door. 

“Hicomein.” I mumbled, throwing away the “you look nice” I'd practiced and running away from the door. 

“Hey.” He responded as he took off his shoes

Don’t wear no shoes in my house! -Roddy Rich.

I scurried back to the couch and covered myself in my emerald green throw blanket. Hiding from him. He moved annoyingly slow as usual. He was wearing black jeans, a black t-shirt, and a lightweight puffer jacket. He had on gold, wire framed glasses, his widow's peak was growing back (I hate that his barber shaves it off), and he had bags under his eyes. He was the thinnest I’d ever seen him. He was “giving” Bella Hadid. I would personally love to be giving Bella Hadid, but Bella Hadid is not a great thing for a 6’3 man to be giving. 

“Lot’s of pink.” He stated. He put his hands behind his back like an old uncle. 

“Yeah, you can sit if you want. Do you want some water?” I said quietly. 

“Umm. What else do you have?” 

I got up and scampered over to the kitchen. I peered in the fridge “I have almond milk, oat milk…um I have chai, but not the good kind. I have chamomile tea, I have Milo, I have decaf espresso, I have regular espresso…oh! And I have the drink of your people. Rooh Afza.” I held up the bottle of Rooh Afza for him to see and smiled. 

“Why do you have that?” He frowned, a little bite in his words.

“For my Pakistani friends when I have my little parties!” I chirped. I've become rather excited about my little parties. 

$@719 looked at me suspiciously. Unable to resist the sweet pink drink of his ancestors, he said “I want the Rooh Afza.” 

“Do you want it with milk or water?” I asked him. 

He was taken aback. “Who’s teaching you this?”

“My friends.” I rolled my eyes. 

“Milk, please.” He narrowed his eyes at me. 

“Oat or almond?”

“Ummmmm. Mix them!” He smiled. “Let's see how it tastes.” 

As I mixed him up his Rooh Afza, I pondered the situation I was in. What's wrong with him? Why is he always acting like he thinks I’m plotting on him? Why does he keep shaving his widow’s peak off? What if he doesn’t like the way I make the Rooh Afza? Kafia taught me how to make it and she knows how to speak Urdu and he doesn't, so if he doesn't like it he's the one that's wrong. Kafia said to call him a “Kutti” if he’s acting weird, but I forgot what it means. What do I do after I serve him his drink? Should I hit that weed pen Ahil bought me? Ana dub. 

$@719 had taken a seat on the side of the couch opposite from my blanket. “Why'd he sit here when there's a perfectly good armchair next to the couch? He desires my demise.” I thought to myself as I placed his pink milk in front of him. I settled myself into the couch next to him. He took a sip of his drink. He raised his eyebrows. I fiddled with the remote. He cleared his throat. I looked at the time. 10:17. I started panicking. 

“How've you been?” He broke the silence. 

“Good! You know…working hard, trying to be on my deen, hanging with friends.”

He looked me over skeptically before narrowing his eyes at the half full wine glass in my hand. “On your deen with a glass of wine?”

I frowned and gingerly put the glass onto my coffee table. “Islam is a journey! I'm trying! I'm praying almost 5 times a day now, I'm eating Halal, I'm making more Muslim friends, and I don't have sex!”

“That's good. That's nice, it's not easy.” He responded. “Wait…no sex? For how long?”

“A little over a year” I announced from my high horse. 

His big eyes got ever bigger. “I'd be losing my mind.”

“It's not very difficult. I never liked it much.” I gloated.”

He smirked. “That's not what I remember.” 

“We literally had to talk about me never initiating!” I said, indignant. 

“Yeah, you're lazy, that doesn't mean you didn't enjoy it.” .

“Yeah well that was with you. I don't usually.” I scoffed.

He looked sooooo proud of himself. The corners of his pretty girl mouth turned up snidely and he raised his eyebrows. If I suffered from poor decision making, I would have slapped the snide smirk smeared on his face right off. But I don't suffer from poor decision making! I am well behaved, I'm a very good girl. I think twice and act once. 

“I couldn't do it…well actually it's been a while. Almost 6 months. Maybe I could.” He replied.

I was livid. He basically had just told me that he knew women that weren't me. How dare he? It is not becoming of a man to be so loose. My jealousy was boiling up, so I quickly changed the subject. 

“Yeah, so I guess I just wanted to say that I'm sorry I've been such a bitch. I think I just liked you way more than I realized and that bothered me a lot. So I just kept lashing out and that wasn't fair to you. I really think you’re great and I hope we can be cool now.” I rambled. 

“Oh I don't even remember all that. It's fine.” He said. 

His comment had me ready to blow a gasket. He didn't remember? I was so insignificant to him that he forgot what happened? I wanted to wring his giraffe neck. 

“Oh okay cool.” I said, humiliated. “Well that was it. That's all I really had to say so-”

He cut me off. “You still watch this show? With those two weird girls.” He pointed at the TV.

He remembers that I watch Broad City, but he doesn’t remember dropping the “L” word on me and blocking me right after because I got jealous? Or ignoring me because I told him he doesn’t care about me? 

“Yeah, Broad City. I love it.” I said quietly, still reeling from embarrassment.

“Oh cool, yeah it's funny, but I still like Curb better.” He said. 

I had to check out of the conversation. It was all too much for my delicate disposition. I'm just a little girl afterall. I couldn't compute what he was doing. He'd just told me how insignificant I was to him. I tried to give him a way to leave, but he cut me off to talk about Broad City…I needed to be alone to process my humiliation! I needed respite! I also kind of needed to keep being next to him…

I watched his hands move as he talked about something I couldn't hear over my own thoughts. I'd forgotten how perfectly big they were. The sight of them enchanted me and my woeful ponderings were swiftly displaced by memories of his notably large hands enveloping my waist. Perhaps it wasn't so easy to be celibate…Perhaps I just wasn't spending time around men I fancied. 

The next time I looked at the clock it read 12:27 am. I’d become very nervous, so I started taking hits off of the dab pen Ahil bought me earlier in the day. $@719, a high-functioning weed connoisseur, was happy to share it with me. We got high. I think we both needed to be high. Perhaps I shouldn't speak for him. I'm doing my best to stop speaking for others. However, he didn't seem at ease and I know he likes weed, so I think it's fair to decide that he needed to be high to sit there with me too. Well, I think it’s fair if you don't factor in the fact that he’d practically told me he doesn't care for me at all and basically wishes me dead just an hour earlier by revealing that he “doesn't remember” what happened between us. If he so undervalues me, he shouldn't need any mental buffer to experience me. 

“Iman?” I heard faintly under the cacophony of my thoughts. 

I'd completely dissociated. “Sorry, I'm high. What did you say?” 

$@719 smiled his big smile “I haven't been smoking, I'm high as fuck too.” He giggled. His giggle is like “hehehehheheheh”. Like if a lamb was trying to laugh like a person. “I asked if you've been dating.”

“I stopped using dating apps. It was all guys starting the conversation with 'where are you from?’ or ‘Are you____’. Idk, I think it's just hard to find what I want.” I sighed. 

“People are weird” he paused and suddenly looked kind of serious. “Do you know what you want?” He asked. 

“Yeah. I want someone thoughtful, kind, a good leader, provider…mmm creative, helpful…silly. I think more than anything, someone I feel connected with… to.” I listed. 

“It's not hard to find someone that will do those things. I'm happy to provide, lead, and all that” he began. 

“Yeah well that's you, but also those things aren't what's hard to find. It's the connection that's difficult.” I sighed. “No one sees me as a person.” Including him.

“What does that mean?” $@719 frowned. 

“Nothing. What about you? Still single?” I asked, hoping he wouldn't say something to vex me. 

“Yeah, I dated a lot for a while. Just figuring out what I like. I found that a 6 year gap is perfect and someone with a background close to mind is ideal.” He shared. 

He vexed me.“Yeah, we’re 7 years apart and we were pretty compatible, so maybe 6 is just right!” I said through gritted teeth. Careful not to let him know I wanted to curb stomp every woman that had touched him. 

“Oh, yeah,  I meant 7 years is perfect”. He said quickly. 

I thought it was kinda weird that he changed what he said, but I was too busy fighting back the urge to start screaming at him for letting women touch him to worry about it. 

We didn't say anything for a while, instead we just kind of looked at each other. I wasn't particularly certain of what to do with myself. I didn't have anything else to say, but I didn't want him to leave. More developed than I was in the past, I concluded that there was something very unique about the way he made me feel. I felt the intensity of the energy he emitted the same way I had when I’d first met him, but age had since blessed me with the grace to manage it. His presence was overwhelming, crushing, and exhilarating. He was horrifying. He was also exquisite? I was embarrassed by the way I thought of him. As a result of my embarrassment, I closed my eyes, which resulted in something far worse…

I felt the hair on my neck stand up as his fingers brushed my supple thighs. Breath caught in my throat and I squeezed my eyes shut, afraid that the visual stimulation coupled with his advances would send me running out of the building. Just as I was about to pass out from nerves, he spoke. 

“Are you falling asleep?” He laughed at me. 

My eyes snapped open and my jaw went slack. I had been falling asleep. I had also been fantasizing about him right in front of him. “Yeah…I don't really smoke often and I was drinking wine before you got here” I smiled, crossfaded. 

“Hmm” he looked down. “So, why did you want to apologize in person?” He questioned. 

Confused, I replied “I told you, I just wanted to make things right between us.” 

“You needed to do that in person?” He badgered. 

I furrowed my brow and recalled his outrageous behavior when he'd returned from Pakistan. I considered replying “Yeah, just like you needed to take me on a date to ‘clear the air between us because Jersey City is so small’” , but I didn't because that would have been pugnacious and inflammatory. I didn't want to push him away again. However, I also didn't know what I wanted to do with him now that he was back in my reach. 

He interrupted my thoughts. “Do you want to have sex?” 

“What a stupid question! Of course I do” I thought. I didn't say that though. Instead I said “I don't think that's a good idea. I think that's been bad for us in the past. I want to be friends. I really value you as a person.”

His demeanor changed when he heard the word “friends” leave my lips. I wished I had the courage to explain to him that I only wanted to be friends because something about him is so bewitching that I'd follow him to Timbuktu, and I couldn't manage that level of emotion in my current state, but I didn't have the courage to say so. And frankly- saying that would have sounded insane! I knew there was no way he would understand. I knew that simply touching him would unravel me, so I said “also-I'm abstinent.”

His thick, perfectly shaped black brows knit together. “Oh, yeah…that's right.” Skepticism stained his face. 

Suddenly, I became very afraid that I'd never see him again. In my fear, I lost control of my mouth and started to vomit some of the dumbest sentences I'd ever spoken. “I really do value you as a friend. You're cool and funny. I don't want to not be friends. I just…I don't know. That” I shook my hands around and raised my eyebrows “will make things complicated.” 

I'd been looking down for the entirety of my speech. When I looked up I was horrified to see a familiar expression on his extraordinarily emotive face. He was looking at me the way he'd looked at me the first time I'd spoken to him. The way he'd looked at me when I arrived 45 minutes late for our first date. He was looking at me like he knew I was full of shit. 

I was just about to expel said shit when he finally spoke. “Is your deen the only reason you're doing this?” 

I wondered if he knew how sick to my stomach he made me. Furthering my ferality, Gov’ner, taking the side of his favorite of the men I interact with, jumped onto the couch and sat right next to $@719.  $@719 looked down at him and with a ridged open palm, began to tap and awkwardly stroke his spotted orange fur. I frowned at them. I couldn't be angry with Gov’ner, he had just finished chemotherapy. I couldn't be angry with $@719, he looked like he'd never touched an animal before in his life. $@719 had always pet Gov'ner like that. However, he didn't often pet him. Although Gov’ner adored him, $@719 seemed slightly uncertain of what to do with Gov’ner. Regardless, Gov’ner constantly imposed himself on $@719; he slept at his feet, by his head, he nuzzled himself next to him while he sat, and he followed him about. $@719 didn't dislike Gov'ner, I think he just never had any clue what to do with a cat as peculiar as him. Relentless as his mother, Gov’ner curled up next to $@719 and slowly blinked at me. 

“Eh-ow” he chirped sharply, pulling me back to the present. 

“Why are you petting him like that, $@719 omg. Don't your parents have a cat? Why are you doing it so weird?” I blurted out.

$@719 giggled his sheeplike giggle. “Their cat doesn't like anyone! She doesn't want me to pet her!”

I rolled my eyes, scooted over to my baby boy, and prepared to face the man determined to accelerate my demise. I grabbed his large, hairy hand and against my will, imagined there was an 18 karat gold band on its ring finger that matched the Art Deco emerald and diamond engagement ring of my dreams before I folded his fingers into a half moon shape and laid them on Gov’ner’s soft belly. Gov’ner stretched out to make more space for $@719’s hand to rub him. $@719 was kind of smiling, forgoing the aloof facade he so often passed of as his persona. I wondered why he pretended in that way and what he’d been like as a young person. As a child really. All he ever shared from his childhood was his admiration for his mother; for her tenacity, perseverance, and her great beauty.  I knew he was not quite the middle child, but the younger of his parent's first batch. It can be concluded that he perhaps needed to be tended by the mother he so loved a bit longer than fate allowed. I knew the older of his younger siblings was around my age, 7 years younger than him. I knew that when I was 7, I began sleepwalking due to a rapid development of consciousness. I knew even that with all of my family’s attention, I struggled under the weight of my mind.  I knew him to be eerily similar to me. Conclusion concedes that he was a lonely child. Perhaps that's why we get along so well. Thinking about it more, we never really didn't get along. We had moments of discomfort that drove us back into preferred solitude. In the same way. I blame him for most of the periods of non communication, but I am at fault too. In some ways. Deep in my ponderance, I forgot where I was. During my absence of attentiveness, the Ghost of Conversations Past returned for me. Unwilling to see what she’d appeared to reveal to me, I jumped from my couch and ran towards the door. Before I made it two steps, I felt a sharp tug on my hair, and fell back onto the couch. “Everywhere you go, you take yourself” she whispered as she wrapped her hands around my black silk nightgown, tore me from my pink velvet couch, chucked me through an expansive darkness, and deposited me into the black leather backseat of $@719’s car. 

Dazed and dizzy, I curled into a fetal position and groaned. My head was throbbing, I couldn't see straight, and the smell of my Clinique Happy was making me nauseous. I rolled over and groaned again, agonized. “Wait, I don't wear Clinique Happy anymore” I thought to myself. More confused than I was agonized, I hauled myself up and steadied my mind. 

“De noche y de día, de noche y de día” I heard $@719 singing slightly off key. 

Realizing my contacts were dried out from the journey and blurring my vision, I wiggled them until they showed me myself and $@719 crossing the Brooklyn Bridge at sunset. He was unabashedly singing his favorite song at the time, “Telepatía”. He was wearing his old glasses with the gray plastic frames. He was healthier then. Handsome as ever in his uniform;  a black shirt, blue jeans, and a shearling jacket. He wore the black sneakers that he always wore. He was not much different than the version of him seated on my pink velvet couch. Though here, his eyes were different. Something about them unsettled me, so I took my eyes off of him and looked at myself. I looked very different. I was laughing and I was giddy. My skin was bronze and shimmery, my hair was light and long, and my clothes were bright and colorful. I looked down at my black nightgown, touched my blunt black haircut, and gasped at my taupe hands. What sucked that sunshine out of me? I watched myself rake my hand through my long caramel and blonde hair while I threw my head back, full of joy. “I'm so beautiful” . I thought to myself. 

“I am so beautiful” Past Iman purred, making eye contact with me in the rear view mirror. 

“Aghhhhh” I screamed, now certain that I was losing my mind.

She “shhh’d” me and twisted her torso in my direction. She at first appeared playful, inviting even…Then in an instant, anger flooded her narrow face. With the agility and swiftness of an apex predator, she lunged over the center console and grabbed a fistful of my wavy black hair. 

“Why’d you dye our hair back to black? Do you know how hard I've been working to maintain this color?” She spat at me.

The great ferality she possessed had since left me. I accepted it with thankfulness. Her ferality was uninhibited, mine was chained up in the basement of my mind, desperate to be freed. 

Knowing her better than I know myself,  I replied “You can’t afford to fly back to Laudy every time your roots get too long! Be for real! Our hair grows over an inch a month! You think you're gonna trust a rando to dye your hair? Look at yourself! You already have 3 inches of black roots and you dyed it 2 months ago.” 

No version of myself takes kindly to spending large sums of our own money. 

Past Iman narrowed her narrow eyes at me. I narrowed my narrow eyes right back at her. In an act of autistic synchronicity, we distrustfully broke eye contact and evaluated our environment. I noted the time, 5:55 pm. I noted the air, warm with a crisp coolness, it was the end of September. I looked back at Past Iman. She looked back at me. 

“Do you know why you're here?” She spoke deviously. 

“Cha!…do you know why I'm here? Cause if you do, jump out of this car and never look back!” I retorted.

Past Iman looked at me like I was an idiot. “We’re not time traveling, this is a memory, I'm your subconscious. I can’t leave”

I looked at Past Iman like she was an idiot.”God, you're so Autistic. Obviously I know I'm looking at a memory.” I actually wasn’t sure it was a memory until she told me. I’m uncertain of my mental stability since I spend so much time alone. 

“Don’t get snippy with me! I'm not the one on a couch trying to figure out how to tell the BFG over here how I feel. I'm on the way to leave my stuff all over his house and arrange everything he owns the way I want it!.” She reached for Past $@719’s arm, taunting me as she touched it, unaffected. “I can even touch him without starting to stim!” She stuck her tongue out at me. 

“You don't get it! He did something evil to make us love him. Let him go!” I shouted, jealous of Past Iman touching him.

“Your imagination is so out of hand that touching him sent you all the way back to me! Keep up, you sound like a neurotypical.”

Infuriated by her insinuation, I lunged forward to remove the hand she’d so arrogantly placed on $@719’s arm, but lurched to a stop when I realized he wasn't moving, the car wasn't moving, and the music had stopped. I began to panic. 

“Are you sure you want to remember this?” Past Iman asked me. 

“No! I don’t want to! Send me back!” I pleaded.

“No” Past Iman whispered in my ear as she took her hands off of Past $@719 and used them to turn my head in his direction. 

I writhed between her hands, trying to get away. However, like a DVD, the scene resumed as though someone had hit “play”. 

“On repeat!” Past $@719 sang with the biggest smile on his face. “Quien lo diria!” He laughed as he shimmied his broad shoulders. 

I’d very purposely put the memory of that evening away. I hated seeing him that way, so boyish and playful. Perhaps that sounds foolish, but you must understand that if I see him that way, I will have to accept him as such! I’d have to admit so much that I cannot manage to speak. So, rather than admit all of those horrid things, I looked away. 

“Look at him you little brat! I'm not going to let you do this to me anymore! I like being with him and you're ruining it. He's not a character you can rewrite to be evil because he made you lo-” She stopped herself, perhaps just as fearful as I am. “Feel for him. He's kind, he is thoughtful, he is silly, and he is a wonderful person. Cut it out!” Past Iman hissed in my ear. 

“He is not!” I shouted back at her. “He doesn't like you and he doesn't want to be around you.”

“Oh, please! You've never asked him what he feels. You just decide everything about everyone around you because you think you're omniscient!”  Past Iman shouted back. 

Vexed and ferocious, I bit Past Iman’s hand, forcing her to release me. She, being me, responded with 10 times my force. 

If someone hurts you, make sure they can never do it again- My Baba

 I instantly regretted my decision. Past Iman still played tennis 6 days a week, present Iman gets on the Stair Climber 3 times a week if she's dedicated. Past Iman grabbed me by my hair and threw me into the back seat. She crawled over the center console and started beating the living daylights out of me. 

“Get yourself together!” She yelled. 

Suddenly she stopped and dug her manicured nails into my shoulders. “Tell the truth!” She yelled at me.

“The truth about what?” I gurgled out. 

She raised her fist; I cowered. “Who defined the relationship as casual and why?” She interrogated. 

“He did! Because he didn't like me” I spat out, defiant. 

“Aghhhhhh!” Past Iman screamed in my face. “Lie to yourself, not to me! If you lie again, I'll knock out one of your teeth.” She made a threat I could not ignore. 

“No! Please not my teeth.” I began to cry. “I defined it as casual! I did it because he didn't text me back for three days one time. It was the weekend Haig was staying at my place in Bushwick. I sent Haig to a hotel then $@719 stayed the night, and we started talking , and he said 'I wanted to talk about-’  and I cut him off and said 'I want this to be super casual’ and he said ‘oh okay cool yeah’. I did it because I knew what he was going to say, so I said it first.” I pleaded. 

“You don't even know what he was going to say. You're always accusing him of wanting to control you, but you’re worse! Fix it!” Iman hollered at me as she beat her fists on my chest. 

Relentless, I retorted “You’re only so upset because you are soooo inn-” 

“Ahhhhh” Past Iman bansheed as she brought her fist down toward my face. “I am not! He's my friend. I only love him as a friend!”

Narrowly avoiding her punch, I responded.“Yeah, call him your friend and he’ll throw you out of this car.” 

She raised her fist again. Afraid for my teeth and finally willing to accept the truth she wanted me to, I nodded. Past Iman nodded back, her long honey blonde hair shimmering in the sunset.

“You really are so beautiful” I smiled. 

She reached over me, opened the door behind my head, and threw me out of the car.

I opened my eyes to find myself back on the couch. I don’t think $@719 noticed I'd gone away. He was still awkwardly petting Gov’ner when I returned. “How did any of that apply here?” I pondered as I watched his hand go from side to side. My ponderings were overshadowed by $@719's boyish earnest. There was something so fragile about his hand being guided by mine…his hand being guided by mine. His hand was being guided by mine because I was touching him.  I wanted to swallow him whole right then and there, so that he could never tell his little skinny restaurant manager girl that knows all my business about this slip in my self control. How could I eat him in one gulp? Even at his thinnest, he was massive. Where to begin? With his hands? No. I wanted to hold them longer. Perhaps his ears? That way I could tell him how I feel without suffering the consequences of him hearing me. Maybe I could begin with his nose? So its profoundness would no longer fill my mind with fantasies of a time where men and their big noses provided for and protected women. Alas, he is far too large to swallow whole… and what if I damaged his big hooked nose in the process? I couldn't have him telling his full time restaurant manager and part time professional tattle tale that I tried to eat him and failed to get the job done. The tattle tale’s name is too particular to disclose without giving away all of my business in this here blog, so I'll call her Curly because she has some of the best 3b/3c curly hair I've ever seen. Curly is an “Op”. She’s not a “girl’s girl”. She's a $@719’s girl. I don't blame her, I get it. Even I struggle to deny him. She knows all the worst things I've ever done to him and probably even validates his feelings instead of telling him that he’s being ridiculous. If she really knew what was good for her she’d tell him to always forgive me so he'd spend less time watching the employees on camera and more time running around with me. 

Anyway, my hand was stuck to $@719’s. 

It wasn’t literally stuck to $@719’s, I just couldn’t move it because deep down inside I didn’t want to move it. I know myself and you know me by now, so you know that I’m uniquely reliable in my narration. So, please be aware that I was aware that the reason I didn’t want to move my hand is because I knew I would likely never be able to make myself touch him again. I didn’t want to touch him again because I was so destabilized by how it felt to touch my hand to his unconsciously. If I were to do that fully aware, I might perish from a cardiac event! I have a heart murmur. I would all be too much. Honestly. 

Perhaps it wouldn’t be so hard to touch him if I told him that I love (?) him. 

In order to tell him that, I first had to process what made me lie to him about the way I felt in the first place.

He left around 3 am.