You only say "I miss you"
at the end of conversations.
Like you're sneaking it in with one breath, or
like it's something that shouldn't be heard by anyone else because it's a
secret well kept that

yes,
you do feel.

And this bothers me -
that you try to hide what is so obvious to me in the backs of your eyes.
It's in your palms and your chin but you still say it like you are
breaking a silence.

And it bothers me that we can't say
"I love you" anymore
because, **** it,
I know we aren't supposed to be "in love" right now -
everything is so taboo -
but if you were to get hit by a bus tomorrow morning,
I would want you to die knowing that my heart goes so much deeper than just
a list of things I did today or a list of things I might do tomorrow

because there is more than just
physical distance between us, now
over these thousand or so miles
we still share our skin and we still share every single moment that lives in between our
fingers.
And that's not the kind of stuff that you can just
shove in the back of your closet and come back to later -
unless of course, you want it to be.

But - you don't. And I know this, because I know you.
I've seen your face twist with tears and
I know the color of your heart when your face gets angry.
Mostly, I know the color of your heart when your face
doesn't change,
but everything else does.

You think you can keep a secret -
but I feel how you feel.
You say "i miss you"
with a lower case i,
like you didn't have the time to fix it
because you are in such a hurry to get the words out like they are
gosspip that you might giggle over but shouldn't, like they are
a box behind a door you shouldn't open, like they are
straight from somewhere so deep inside you,
only I have seen

and let me tell you something
I miss you, too.

So now it's your turn -
tell me
why are we still hiding?

and what, *******,
what
are we so afraid of?