And You Stay

The next morning, there was another message waiting.

It was still harmless on the surface. Safe. The kind of greeting that could pass unnoticed in an ordinary exchange.

But something in it had already shifted.

“Good morning, my kisses. Here now at my part-time job.”

Kisses? I thought.

I noticed the word immediately — and then did what I had already learned to do with certain things he said. I pretended not to see it.

“Hey. Good morning,” I replied. “Waiting for the bus now. Until what time are you working?”

There was no response for a while. Almost an hour passed.

And yet I found myself updating him anyway.

“Touchdown office,” I wrote later. “Enjoy the rest of your day.”

Not long after that, a photo arrived.

A selfie.

I stared at it for a second and laughed to myself.

How vain could this guy be?

But I was smiling when I answered.

“Hey!”

A moment later he replied.

“I’m still here waiting for my clock-out time. Did you see the photo?”

It sounded like he had noticed my careful indifference.

“Yeah, I saw it,” I said. “You look tired. Haha.”

His answer came quickly.

“Well… I'm always tired. I sent it just in case you forget how I look. And just in case you see me somewhere and feel like you want to hug me — so you know.”

I chose the safest answer I could think of.

“That’s impossible,” I wrote. “You’re asleep when I’m awake.”

“Nothing is impossible to a positive thinker,” he replied.

I didn’t know what to say to that.

Then another message appeared.

“So… will you hug me?”

I paused before answering.

“Let’s see,” I wrote.

It was the most harmless response I could offer.

He added something as if finishing the sentence for me.

“Each other first?”

“Like how?” I asked.

“You know the answer to that. I’m free, and you know my schedule.”

I tried to move the conversation somewhere lighter.

“Oh… why don’t we go to the beach on your birthday?”

Then I remembered.

“Oh wait. You have work.”

He said we should talk about it on the phone instead. I agreed without thinking too much about it.

A few minutes later he texted again to say he was already home.

I told him he should sleep.

His reply was playful — a little too playful — the kind of message that makes you pause before answering.

So I just wrote:

“Oh well.”

Then he asked a question I didn’t quite know how to answer.

“Should I just go away and disappear?”

I stared at the screen longer than I expected to.

Finally I said the only thing that felt neutral.

“That’s up to you.”

His answer came quickly.

“This is not on me. It’s on you.”

I didn’t know what I was supposed to feel in that moment.

I didn’t want to lose him.

But being with him didn’t feel simple either.

So I told him the truth the only way I knew how.

“My brain cells say yes… disappear,” I wrote.

“My other cells say no, don’t disappear. You know very well that I’m in a very complicated situation.”

“I know you are,” he said. “But did I complain?”

“No,” I answered. “You didn’t. But I don’t want you worrying about me. I’m sure there will come a point when the situation becomes difficult. And you would worry.”

He paused for a moment before replying again.

“So your mind says no, but your body says yes?” he wrote.

Then he added:

“Just tell me straight up if you want me to stop.”

I thought about that for a moment.

“My question is this,” I replied. “If I give you the chance to stay… why would you?”

His answer came without hesitation.

“Because I’m happy falling for you.”

Then another message followed.

“I didn’t know I was looking for love… but you taught my heart to fall in love on June 9th.”

I stared at the screen.

Could this really be happening?

Is that how these things begin — suddenly, without warning?

“Really?” I answered. “We literally just met.”

Instead of explaining himself, he sent me a music video.

Everything But The Girl – I Didn’t Know I Was Looking for Love.

I almost laughed when I saw it.

He didn’t know that was one of my favorite songs.

I told him I loved Everything But The Girl.

I also shared with him that I remembered shouting “I love you!” to the band during the concert, then he replied “I love you too.”

Then he added:

“The band won’t answer… so I did.”

Weird guy, I thought.

But I was smiling again.

He told me that a few days before the concert, he had saved a meme with the band’s vocalist in the background and the words:

“You taught my heart to love on June 9th.”

He said he didn’t know why he suddenly felt the urge to show it to me.

So I told him something that had quietly crossed my mind.

“Maybe if I had arrived earlier that night, we wouldn’t have met,” I said. “So maybe there’s a reason.”

His reply came almost immediately.

“We have to meet.”

I looked at that sentence longer than I expected to.

Not because it was surprising. Because it sounded inevitable.

Like something that had already begun moving long before either of us admitted it.

For a moment, I considered all the sensible answers.

The careful ones. The responsible ones. The ones that protect a life that is already built.

But none of those were the words I sent.

Instead, I typed the simplest reply.

“Okay.”

Then another thought followed it.

“Let’s meet.”

I stared at the screen for a second before finishing the sentence.

“And you stay.”

After that, the conversation went quiet.

But something about the silence felt different.

As if a door had just opened somewhere between us—

and neither of us had tried to close it.