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So Feyi had moved down to New York, because if she was a monster, then so was the city, glorious and bright and everlasting, eating up time and hearts and lives as if they were nothing. She wanted to be consumed by the relentless volume of a place so much louder than she was, a place where her past and her pain
could drown in the noise.
No one in New York cared about the vintage of the sadness tucked behind her eyes and in the small corners of her smiles. She didn’t have to drive, and she could cry on the train and no one would look, no one would care, because she didn’t matter, and it was, honestly, such a relief to stop mattering.
She liked the city as an entity better; it didn’t care who you were or what your damage was, it ate everyone up indiscriminately.
Feyi liked the proofs of want, like Milan making reckless choices in that bathroom, like this man making a fool of himself right now.
She wasn’t wrong about Feyi’s forming patterns, either, the way she chose Milan because he didn’t want anything deeper than what she was offering yet worried there was something wrong with her because he wanted only what he wanted and not more.
“I feel mad inconsistent,” she’d told Joy. “Like, half the time everything is chill, and I feel fine, but then I remember who he is and that this is so new, and it totally freaks me out.”
Joy had shrugged. “He knew what he was getting into with you, and besides, you’re worth it, Feyi. You can be yourself, as messy and contradictory as you like. He’s lucky to be even near you.”
Like even if I still felt alone, at least I felt like I was alone next to your alone, like our alones could walk together.
You feel like the first time in a long time I can even wonder about a possibility of not feeling alone.”
“A lot of people have come up this mountain,” he was saying. “You’re the first one I don’t want to let back down.”
You were like light. I couldn’t help but to turn my face to you if I wanted to keep living.”
I want you for myself, and that, that is why I kissed you.”
“I’m saying you make me feel not alone, Feyi. I don’t think you understand how hard I’ll fight for that, how long it’s been since I had that.”
“I’m all in, sweetness. As long as you’re here with me, as long as you want this, too.”
“What, setting our lives on fire?”
“I’ll burn with you,”
“Sweetness, you have me for as long as you want, however much or little you want. I’m not going anywhere.”
“I also want you to choose what’s best for you, but if you were wondering where I stood on it, or what I wanted, it’s you. Here, with me.”
I want you here, I want you. I want to fall asleep with your skin against
mine. I want to do everything I can to make sure no one ever hurts you again. I want to wake up and see your face in the sunrise.”
“What will you do when you get tired of me?”
“You’re a whole world to me, Feyi. I could spend the rest of my life learning you and I’d never get tired.”
“I want to be with you. I feel clear about that, even when I’m terrified that you’ll change your mind about wanting to be with me. This feels… right. It feels like living in another world, one that’s just off to the side from the one everyone else is in, but it feels right.”
He had enough of his own and this was hers, her monster to fight and slay and skin, dry it in the sun, hang it on her wall as a reminder that she was more than what the voices in her head tried to tell her.
I love how you lean into grief and somehow use it to be even more alive. You’ve shifted my whole world, brought me light and company and a joy I forgot I could feel.
