Between the Pipes (Offsides #3)

by J.J. Mulder

“Listen, you’re in the same boat I was.” I know, I think, that’s why I need your advice. “It sounds like both of us fell for a person, not a gender.

Plate empty in front of me, the sky throwing shafts of pink and orange light across the sky, I stretch my legs out. I feel oddly peaceful, and relaxed in a way that is unfamiliar to me. I spend so much time coiled tight with anxiety, I can hardly recognize comfort when it’s presented to me.

It burns me how much I like him. I like him so fucking much I hate him.

There are so many reasons not to get attached to this man; so many reasons not to get attached to any man, in fact. I’m still trying to figure out how to navigate my own life, right now, and any therapist worth their salt would tell me I’m not in the correct place for a relationship.

I miss him terribly, in a way uncomfortably similar to the way I missed my perfect vision right after I lost it; like something fundamental is missing from me.