you live in my words

"Seat taken?"

"Huh?"

"You mind if I sit here?"

"It's a free country."

"Buy you a drink?"

"No thanks."

"It's not every day someone refuses a free drink."

"I don't drink."

"Then why are you sitting alone at a bar of all places?"

"To remind myself."

"Remind yourself of what?"

"Why I do this."

"You're very vague."

"Sorry."

"What's her name?"

"What?"

"You keep looking at the entrance."

"Oh, just a habit."

"From what?"

"She used to show up late."

"She?"

"Yeah."

"I knew there was a girl."

"Was."

"What happened?"

"Long story."

"I got time."

"She moved."

"Ah."

"Yep."

"Where'd she go?"

"Far away."

"Why'd she move?"

"Not really sure. I don't blame her though."

"When did she move? Recently?"

"Five years ago."

"Five years?!"

"Yeah."

"You're still hung up on her?"

"Yeah."

"You're a hopeful sonuvabitch aren't ya? Persistent too."

"I'm a lot of things."

"You didn't follow her?"

"It's more complicated than that."

"That's usually what people say when they don't want to admit the truth."

"It's not as simple as it should be."

"It never is."

"Mhm."

"You still talk to her?"

"Yeah. Sometimes."

"Does that make it easier?"

"Depends on the day."

"What do you tell her?"

"Half of what I want to."

"What do you want to tell her?"

"That I miss her beyond reason. That I still see her everywhere."

"Like where?"

"On license plates. Foggy glass. Planes in the sky. The moon. My reflection in the mirror."

"Your reflection?"

"Yeah."

"Explain."

"I don't remember who I was before her, and I don't know who I am without her."

"Damn. Sounds rough."

"It is."

"What else would you want to tell her?"

"That I'm sorry."

"Sorry for?"

"If I ever made her doubt how special she is to me."

"That sounds hard to carry."

"It is."

"Not to be rude, but that sounds exhausting."

"It is."

"Why don't you just let her go?"

"Because I can’t.”

"You can’t? Or you don't want to?”

"Both."

"You don't want peace?"

"She was my peace."

“You know what I mean.”

“I want her.”

"You're doing this to yourself."

"You don't get it, and that's fine."

"Oh, I get it. I just think it's foolish."

"Oh well."

"You should love yourself more."

"Heard that before."

"You're stuck."

"Like gum on the bottom of her shoe."

"That's pretty clever."

"Thanks."

"Let me ask you something."

"Go ahead."

"Are you in love with her?"

"Yes. Irretrievably.”

"Wow. No hesitation?"

"Why would there be?"

“When’s the last time you saw her?”

“Four years ago.”

“Jesus, dude. That’s a long time.”

“Tell me something I don’t know.”

“Do you believe you’ll ever see her again?”

“I have to.”

“Sounds like a prayer when you say that.”

“Something like that.”

“What do you think it would be like?”

“Like picking up right where we left off.”

“You don’t even know who she is now.”

“I know who she was and that’s enough.”

“Do you think she was the one?”

“Is.”

“What?”

“She is the one.”

“Then why’d you let her go?”

“I didn’t.”

“How do you figure?”

“I let her be who she is.”

“And who is that?”

“A girl looking after herself.”

“And who are you in all of this?”

“Someone who loves her without asking her to become someone else.”

"That's noble of you."

"I guess."

“That sounds lonely though.”

“It is. Immensely.”

"Does she know?"

"Know what?"

"That you love her."

"Yeah."

"And?"

"And what?"

"Does she believe you?"

"Probably not."

"Do you think she loves you?"

"..."

"Sorry, I shouldn't have asked that. Did she ever ask you to come?"

"She's not like that."

"What's she like then?"

“Different.”

“Different how?”

"She pulls away when she's afraid she'll ask too much. She loves deeply but in a way that keeps her safe."

"How does that make you feel?"

"Stuck, yet enamored."

"She sounds confusing."

"She is. She's a Rubik's Cube in human form and I still love her."

"So you're telling me you still love her the same through all this time apart?"

"Yes."

"Despite the distance?"

"Yes."

"And the silence?"

"Yes."

"Despite the fact that she built a whole life somewhere else."

"Yes."

"I don't know, man. People change."

"She's free, and knowing how she is, she's growing too."

"I hate to say it, but I think you're in love with a ghost."

"I'm in love with a woman who exists whether I see her or not."

"You're in deep."

"Like the Mariana Trench."

"What do you like most about her? Her eyes? Smile? Her ass?"

"Her soul."

"C'mon man. Give me a real answer."

"Her wounds. How she thinks. How she makes me want to a better man. How I felt next to her."

"How did you feel?"

"Like I could spend the rest of my life in a conversation with her."

"Did you laugh a lot together?"

"All the time."

"How was her laugh. Feminine?"

"It was perfect. Like sunlight escaping a mason jar."

"That's poetic. You should be a writer or something."

"Hahaha."

"What's so funny?

"Nothing."

"You think she ever thinks about you?"

"Yes."

"How can you be so sure?"

"Because we're connected in ways she's afraid to accept."

"You're betting your life on that?"

"I'm living my life with that."

"All this talk of her, I still don’t know what her name is.”

"It doesn't matter."

"You...can't tell me her name?"

"It hurts to say it."

"Hmm. You ever wonder what she'd think if she overheard this?"

"She'd be pissed and happy at the same time. Definitely uncomfortable."

"Why?"

"She doesn't like being praised out loud. She prefers being background noise."

"Modest girl, eh?"

"In the best way."

"But you don't see her that way? As background noise?"

"No. She's all I see."

"If she were here right now, what would you say to her?"

"That I've missed her in a way that is indescribable. That love is too weak of a word. That there's nothing she could say to me that would make me love her any less. That's she incomparably beautiful. That she's brave. That she's seen. That she's often misunderstood but is worth understanding. That I know she feels no one has her back. That I know isolation makes her feel safe but it isn't the answer. That vulnerability isn't for nothing. That closeness doesn't always end in ruin. That I've never known love until I found it in her."

"Wow. Anything else?"

"Yeah. That I'll always miss the things we never had the chance to be."

"I'm sure that hurts you."

"It does."

"Do you forgive her?"

"There's nothing to forgive."

"Nothing?"

"She loved in the way she knew how. That's what I choose to believe."

"You don't love her less for that?"

"I love her more, actually."

"How's that?"

"Because I've learned it's better to love in a such a way that the other person feels free."

"That sounds like a plea. A surrender actually."

"No. It's trust."

"In what?"

"In who she is and what we were."

"So, if you believe this, why do you still feel hurt?"

"Because we were a bud that never blossomed. We were potential without fruition. We were a wishbone ripped apart and no wish came true."

"That's a strange grief to process."

"The heaviest kind."

"Do you think she knows all this?"

"I think she feels it without expressing it. That's her style."

"If you could ask her one question right now, what would you ask her?"

"I'd ask if she ever doubted that she mattered."

"And if she said yes?"

"I'd tell her she was wrong."

"Would you tell her about the pain?"

"The pain is mine to carry. She never owed me more of herself to ease it."

"Would you change anything about her?"

"Her last name."

"What do you want from her?"

"For her to feel free. To know she was loved in absence, especially in absence."

"She might never come back."

"I know."

"And you're still patient."

"Yes."

"Why?"

"Because loving her taught me how."

"If she asked tomorrow..if she came back into your life and said she was ready."

"I'd meet her where she is, not where I froze five years ago."

"And if she doesn't?"

"Then this was the truest love of my life."

"And that's enough?

"It has to be."