Already?

She told me she loved me 

     And 

I froze

    Starring her in the eyes

I wasn’t sure she knew what she was saying 

    I asked, 

“. . . Already?”

   She didn’t respond

I thought maybe she was falling asleep

   And didn’t know what she was saying

I thought maybe she was drunk

     But we only drank two beers

I wondered if she popped something, like a downer

   But I didn’t think that was her style 

And I’ve been with her for almost every second for the last eight hours 

   No

She was wide awake

   And she was wanting to go at it again

And afterwards, as we lay naked in her bed

    She said it again 

“I love you.”

   . . . I just looked at her, frozen again.

I think I gulped

   She asked, “What’s wrong?”

And I said, “. . . No one has ever said that to me before . . .”  

      I hadn’t been aware of it until that moment

No one had ever told me that they were in love with me before . . . It was true. She was the first to do it. 

    Later on, after we had gone another round

She asked me if I loved her

    I lied

And told her that I did

    But,

It didn’t really feel like a lie . . .

    We went at it again

And afterwards

   She asked me,

“Are you going to leave me?’”

      And I said, 

“Yeah, I am leaving in the morning. But . . . I’ll be back."

CH 1/21/22