Unfinished, Still.

This never took place, but it should have.

“We should talk like this more often,” he said.

“I know, dear.” She traced his face, her favorite picture, and put it in her pocket.

“I was thinking about rules today,” she said.

“Rules?”

“Yeah.” She was looking away from him now. “They’re always broken at night. The biggest ones, anyway. I think it’s the moon.”

“Of course it’s the moon.” She was staring again as she pulled the covers over her shoulders.

“So, I’m asking for your permission.”

“My permission?”

“Yes. To love you.”

“That’s the rule?”

“It’s the one I’m breaking.”

“Is this about summer ending?”

She looked down and replayed the last three months in her mind. Emails were the new love letters, and she kept them all as proof.

“You love me now,” he said. She wasn’t sure if it was an insult or not.

“That’s the sad part.” Her voice was shaking. “I keep trying to. You won’t let me. You keep fighting back and I don’t know if you even know you’re doing it. I thought if I asked it might make a difference.”

He stared up at the ceiling. She was looking at his bedroom door, gathering the location of her belongings in her mind in case she had to leave. She knew she wouldn’t, so did he, but she had to give herself the chance.

“You still have a lot to learn. Maybe you’d be better off without me.”

She had heard this before, but this time she didn’t believe it.

“I wouldn’t leave unless you made me.”

“There’s a lot you don’t know, darling.”

“What are you so afraid of?” she finally asked, knowing he wouldn’t tell her. He stopped to think, and she thought she may have surprised him.

“If I left, would you call?” he asked responsively.

“No,” she answered.

“Why not?”

“I’ll think it’s because you don’t want me anymore,” she said, already believing that it would be true.

“And if I called?”

“I’d answer.”

“Why?”

“Because I’d still want to be the person you’d write about for the right reasons.”

She kissed him, wondering if he’d be there in the morning.