The news
(29/06/14)
It was a Sunday
I remember it was raining as you got into my car.
You plonked yourself into the passenger seat and
stared straight ahead.
Your eyes fixed themselves on the grey wetness that
sat on the other side of the windscreen.
From out of nowhere
you tensely
stated
“I don’t know
how to say this, so I’ll just blurt it out…”
Everything seemed to stop as my mind raced.
I thought of everything you were possibly going to
say…
Well, ‘everything’ which was centred around your
rejection of me.
It seems I thought of everything except
this.
It took me a while to realise that your lips had
stopped moving.
In all honesty, I wasn’t completely surprised by the
news,
I was confused
by what was
happening here, here right now.
Your eyes darted towards mine and then as quickly,
darted back towards the rain hitting the windscreen,
Except… you were looking past it.
Your body tensed, as if readying itself to open the
car door and flee at any moment.
We were still parked out the front of your
apartment.
The lines above your tense eyes read, ‘In a few steps
I could escape to the safety of home’.
Upon reflection,
I guess you
were worried that I would reject you, maybe you even feared it.
I turned to you and smiled.
I loved you just the same.
We hugged and I wanted to kiss you,
Back then, it would have been our first.
Even now, the only thing I still don’t understand,
Is why it was you and not me.
It should have been me,
For all the many reasons you will never need to
know.
copyright matthew schiavello 2014