That Look

The starfish on the shelf—a gift from my ex—suddenly felt ridiculous when she laughed at it. I defended the thing like it mattered. Maybe I was drunk, but pretty sure I wasn’t. There was something about the way she moved through my apartment that made me need to prove a stupid toy was worth something, which tells you everything about where my head was.

After a while the space stopped feeling cramped. We just kind of drifted through the evening without talking much, ended up at the video store because what else do you do. Picking something took forever. Neither of us wanted to make the wrong call. I grabbed something she’d probably seen already, didn’t mention it. Figured saying anything would head us somewhere neither of us was ready for.

Back at the place with Mario Barth on the screen—some German comedian, don’t remember his name now—and then it happened. That look. I’d only caught flashes of it before, but suddenly it was right there, unmissable, aimed at me. A nod. Her hand finding mine. And the movie became background noise.

I kissed her neck. She didn’t pull back but she wasn’t meeting me halfway either, like she was doing math in her head about something. Don’t kiss me, she said, but not really to me—more like an instruction to herself. Not on the mouth. So that’s how we worked it. Close as possible without crossing that one line. Hands everywhere. Her breath getting faster. That look whenever I moved closer, like she was testing whether I’d stop or keep going. I kept going.

The movie ended. We switched to something else—Cold Angels or whatever. Didn’t matter. We were against the wall and she was responding to everything, her mind clearly fighting with her body about whether this was something she was allowed to want. That song playing—”Colorblind”—that’s the moment I held onto. The rest was texture and heat and the fact that she kept her mouth from me but gave me the rest.

I don’t know what would’ve happened if I’d pushed. If I’d tried to kiss her anyway. I didn’t. She didn’t come back, or if she did it wasn’t to my place. But that look—the wanting and the hesitation both at the same time—that got stuck in me. Still is.