once on a bench twice on a bench.

"I'm not very good at making friends." I said.

"...I'll be your friend," he said.

My ice cream cone melted slowly like the silence. Slowly as our speech. Slowly like the time was eaten up as I stared up at the tops of the low buildings and the fire escapes in the distance. The dusty blue sky---the moments we were separate---but together and what was to be slipped away from us somewhere into the invisible distance, twirling and gold and unreal.

There was something removed about us.

Somehow in my previous lives, I was never able to remove myself. I always clung too fast, and pushed others until it was impossible to exist beside them.

And why is it like that with you? Removed.

I can leave early. I can say goodbye first, pushing down the urges I have to grab your hand from behind your back as you quickly stride ahead of me with your larger, sturdier gait. We have this space...

All I wanted was to be pushed up against a wall and held down by the way you breathe.

We left soon thereafter. It was a nice night. Perhaps I had a hair out of place, but for all the wrong reasons.

I wondered if it would always be this way.

On the short ride home I wanted nothing but to feel the wind hit my face.

"Everything will be all right", I said into your salty earlobe.

The silence that followed was lengthy, and left me wondering whether or not that was true.