Dark Matter

by Blake Crouch

It’s the beautiful thing about youth. There’s a weightlessness that permeates everything because no damning choices have been made, no paths committed to, and the road forking out ahead is pure, unlimited potential.

The fourth step on the staircase that always creaks. The downstairs bathroom with the leaky faucet. The way my kitchen smells as coffee brews first thing in the morning. All the tiny, seemingly insignificant details upon which my world hangs.

take so many moments with you for granted. I walk out the door to work, and I’m already thinking about my day, about the lecture I have to give, whatever, and I just…I had a moment of clarity getting on the train about how much I love you. How much you mean to me. Because you never know.”

I thought I appreciated every moment, but sitting here in the cold, I know I took it all for granted. And how could I not? Until everything topples, we have no idea what we actually have, how precariously and perfectly it all hangs together.

I want her in a way I can’t explain. That I don’t ever want to be able to explain, because the mystery of it is a perfect thing.