Dear Aaron

by Mariana Zapata

“You could’ve told me your mom and sister are the ugly ones in the family.”

The way he hugged the hell out of me would be something that sickness and death could never take away. And

in the time it took me to suck in a breath, I put my own arms around him. I’d hugged dozens of men before. Dozens and dozens, hundreds of times. And Aaron’s upper body was just as wide and solid in front of mine like the best of them.

My friend had come. This man whose beauty had nothing to do with what was on the outside.

“I like you just the way you are, stalker.”

Looking back on it, it’s weird thinking about the moments you don’t realize are important. The sentences, the touches, the actions that seem so innocent in that second, you take them for granted. The words that make water into wine in the course of your life. But I would never forget the way his words made me feel. The way he made me feel right then.