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After a while, you begin to wonder what you’re doing anymore. You’re obviously caught, obviously tethered, with no way to cut the rope. It’s torture, knowing you’re better but that things will never change, and knowing that the courage to make the change simply isn’t there. Of course, it’s not your courage; no, you have enough courage to move mountains because you’re still here, you’re still doing the same thing you’ve always done despite the consequences that go with it. No, they don’t have the courage. He doesn’t have the courage.
And it’s funny, really, in that way that’s not funny at all, that the change would make life better and easier and more fulfilling—at least, from what you can see—but they simply won’t make the change, they won’t move. So you’re stuck in this fucking limbo, almost wishing for the worst of it because that’s when you had the most, before everyone had to become all self-aware of themselves and stop sneaking around. Sure, there’s no more sneaking around, there’s just silent dying because you know, you fucking know that you’re the only one who really ever does anything. Because she can’t. Not the way you can. And it’s so clear in his smiles, but he doesn’t want to touch her the way he wants you. He doesn’t want to kiss her like the way he wants your mouth around him, holding him down.
It doesn’t even matter, it doesn’t have to be public or shouted about, you just want him to know it as much as you know with every fiber of your being that you want him. He wants you, you fucking know it. You can see it when he looks at you and when he gasps out your name and claws at your back. You’re a fucking star, you deserve it; it should be yours.
But then you remember that you’re quiet. You’re not selfish, and you’re quiet. You don’t say things, you don’t point them out, you just let them happen. You let them happen like you let him call you to his bed, even though you know the details. You let them happen like you let yourself kiss him, and grind into him, and fuck him on the same sheets where they sometimes lay together, only ever fully clothed. You let them happen like you let him drift away when she finds out, you let him go and don’t ask for him back. You let them happen like you let him text you about how much he fucking wants to be with you again, wants you to kiss him and mouth at his chest and touch him and fill him up. You let them happen like you let yourself tear up when he says you make him feel safe, and he wants to feel you wrapped around him when the sky is dark. You fucking let things happen like you back off and let him ask you for advice and see her and romance her and you are silent.
You want to scream. You want to break things, because you just fucking figured it out, and it all falls to pieces.
They gave you a new one, and she’s nice enough. But your hand hangs limp, same as your mouth, and you almost want to beg her forgiveness because no one, no one should ever have to be quiet. And now she’s quiet for a living, for a job. You want to pamper her and be so fucking kind because you wore uniforms together and you walked the same halls and scoffed at teachers, and now she’s just a pawn in a poorly played game that far too many people believe.
And so you keep your mouth shut as they make plans for the future, and you will never, ever fucking believe it because he still texts you at night. He still asks for you, but never calls, because they’re still having “trust issues”, and you try so hard not to laugh in his face. “Trust issues”, he says, and looks at you like you hang the moon, and wears your clothes, and watches you dance onstage, and steals your heart.
Even as they’re splashed across the pages, out and open in the media like the severely “private” relationship they are, you know that you’ll always come running if he calls again. You’ve known ever since that stuffy day when you turned your head and he took his in-ear out. You’ve known ever since that day he refused to look at you while he knew she was sitting there, watching from the back of the audience. You’ve known definitely, deep down, ever since that festival where you serenaded each other onstage and then you let her go. It’s only ever been him, and years from now, it will still be him.
And a part of you whispers, ever so softly, that he will call.
Someday.