It's taken me a long time to get here. To this place where I hold myself before holding another.
At the beginning, we spoke of it--the lack of spark, the lack of passion in our tongues and fingertips as we danced together through the night. But we felt comfortable. I felt peaceful. She felt herself.
My heart reached, wanted, desired (for how else do hearts begin to journey into ache), but my mind ran circles around what was happening between us, taunting my heart with its wisdom just as my heart was beginning to step away from the ground.
She is not attracted to you, it chided. Where is your self-respect?
And for a while, I thought I could ignore it. I thought I could drown out my inner-voice with Emi's voice singing along constantly to the music we were listening to, to the sound of my blood pumping in my ears, to the sound of her breath quickening as she arrived.
But I have come too far to lose myself now--not even for the softness of Emi, not even for the ease at which we exist together.
For the first time in my life, I love my body. The softness. The curves. The green/blueness of my eyes. The way I walk. My breasts. My feet.
And it was last night watching Alix Olson perform that I realized others noticed, too. Glances and smiles. Lingering eye contact.
And all day I thought: Can I accept feeling desired by two or three strangers but not by the woman holding my hand and kissing my cheeks?
In the end: no. No. Not even for Emi with her beauty and generosity, with her intelligence and warmth, with her blue, blue eyes