OO PROLOGUE
Have you ever felt hollow? Not lonely — loneliness at least has a pulse. This is different. This is lacking warmth. Like the heat left your chest one day and just… never came back. You're not missing a person. You're missing a feeling. And somehow that's harder to explain.
It all started with him.
I am in love — or was. Or maybe I still am, which is the most inconvenient truth of all. Because how do you stop loving someone who broke something in you? Not with their absence. With a lie.
And not even a grand, dramatic lie. A small one. But it was about something that mattered — something I wanted with him — and he looked me in the face and chose the lie. I caught him. And the worst part? His own philosophy was simple: if you're going to lie, don't get caught. Well. He got caught. By me. On his own rule.
We'd caught each other before. That's what happens in messy, real love. But this one was different. This one cracked something open.
Now I see lies everywhere. In everyone. When people talk to me, I'm not just listening — I'm reading. Scanning. Waiting for the thread that unravels. I never used to do that. I used to give people the benefit of the doubt. Now I can't even give them the benefit of a sentence.
We broke up. And I've been hollow ever since.
I still miss him. After all this time, I still miss him. A song came on and suddenly I wasn't here anymore — I was back there, back in those memories, back in what we did to that song. You know the kind.
I'm trying to forget. I doubt I ever will.
* * *
Sometimes you're doing fine. You're minding your business, living your life — and then his name lights up your phone.
I still have his contact saved. I don't know why. Maybe because deleting it feels too final. Maybe because some part of me isn't ready for that kind of goodbye.
He reached out. Apologized — because he knew he was wrong, knew I was hurt. And God help me, I was tempted. I really was. Until he used that word. The one I hated. The one he knew I hated. And just like that, the door slammed shut again. If it wasn't for that word, maybe we'd have found our way back. Maybe.
Because we were perfect. I know how that sounds. I know everyone says that about the one that got away. But we were. Not a fairy tale perfect — a real perfect. The kind where you can just be yourself, all your ridiculous, nonsensical, no-sense-having self, and they look at you like you're the funniest, most endearing thing they've ever seen.
He'd laugh at me. Call me silly. Call me stupid. Then say — "that's why you have me, to give you sense." And I'd say why should I make sense when you're there? Gives you more room to be the man. And we'd both laugh.
God, we'd laugh.
And the sex…
I don't even know where to start. His birthday. Lord. I rode him like I had something to prove and everything to lose. And his kisses — underneath my neck first, pulling my chin upward, holding me at that exact angle like he knew precisely what he was doing. Then bending down, capturing my lips, pulling my lower lip between his, coaxing my mouth open. Slow. Deliberate. Like he had all the time in the world and I was the only destination.
He'd pull back. Look at me. And I'd laugh — because what else do you do when someone kisses you like that? He'd smile. Ask if I wanted more.
I always nodded.
Good girl, he'd say.
…I need to stop.
* * *
I had to stop myself.
I came back from memory lane and realized — I was wet. Soaking. My own mind had done that to me. Just the memory of him. His hands. His fingers on my skin. His touch, his words, his breath so close it felt real. My body remembered everything my mind was trying to forget.
I wanted him to touch me. Badly. But he wasn't there. So I did what I always do — I distracted myself.
Scrolled through my phone. Bad idea. Everything on my timeline felt sexual. Every video, every post, every sound. Like the universe was in on it. And between my legs, my body was restless — like it had been claimed, like he'd left a key somewhere inside me and my body was still waiting for him to use it.
So I got busy. Work. Appointments. Art classes. Anything to fill the hours and quiet the wanting. Not just wanting him — wanting to be touched. By anyone. By him most of all, if I'm being honest. I forgave him. I did. I just don't want him back.
Well.
I don't want him back. But I won't lie and say I don't want him.
There's a difference.
We spoke briefly, a few months back. I hinted at things. He laughed — that dense, unbothered laugh of his — and said "what do you want?" Like he already knew. Like he was enjoying it.
And then one night, very late, he showed up. At my place. Just like that.
Fuck, I said.
Yeah, he answered.
* * *
I told him it was too late. He didn't really argue. Didn't really explain either. I kept asking myself — is he really too late? Is he really? I never got a real answer. Never found out if it was guilt, regret, missing me, or just his body remembering mine the same way mine remembers his.
He just said — if we're meant to be, I'll find my way back to you.
And I said — you think I'll be waiting?
He said — life has a way of making things work. If you want it to.
And then he left.
And I'm still here. Asking myself if I want it to.
* * *
Now all I do is ask myself — what do I want?
Is it love? Is it loss? Is it him specifically, or just the version of me that existed when I was his?
Because here's the thing. He is the only one who ever shows up in my sexual thoughts. The only one. And maybe that's because he's the only one who's had years to learn me — every curve, every line, every quiet place on my body that I didn't even know existed until he found it. He didn't just know my body. He memorized it.
Everyone around me thinks I'm over him. I let them think that. It's easier.
But if you asked me right now what I want — truly, honestly, embarrassingly want — it's to be under him. Literally.
I tried dating. Went on a few, let's call them adventures. Crappy ones. Silly ones. Dates that made me miss him more because the comparison was just cruel. And the worst part? Not a single one of them triggered anything in me. Nothing. No spark. No heat. No want.
And I am not a cold person. I wake up wanting. I go to bed wanting. I get stirred by the smallest things. That part of me is very much alive.
It's just that he seems to be the only one with the key to it.
Like he activated something in me that only responds to him now. And I don't know if that's love or just the cruelest kind of muscle memory
