…Or

Maybe someday,

we’re in some cozy kitchen,

you stirring a sauce

while I chop too slowly,

and we’re bumping hips

like none of it ever hurt.

You’d laugh

and say,

“Remember when we almost gave up?”

And I would

the silence,

the cold mornings,

the almosts.

But we didn’t.

We kept reaching,

kept burning things on the stove

just to feel warmth.

And maybe love

was never the fireworks.

Maybe it was this

us,

tired,

still trying,

still here.

Happy,

That we chose this.

-or-

Maybe someday,

in some version I made up,

we’re in a small kitchen,

you humming,

me barefoot and pretending

not to watch you cook.

You’d say,

“Wild we almost didn’t make it,”

and I’d smile

because in that life,

we did.

But here,

in this one,

we didn’t.

We let it go.

We walked away.

Still, some nights

Most nights

I sit with the ghost of that moment,

imagining us

choosing to stay.

And maybe that’s its own kind of love

the kind that wonders,

even now.

What if.