And in a black t-shirt of his, I said, aren’t you ready to see all my tattoos?

I don’t know if I can make it to the concert. Today my feet are made of sand paper, in three weeks they’ll be made of clay, and then ice that slips, and then they’ll just feel like everything I know about neurology.

I can’t make it to the concert because we aren’t friends. I can’t make it because I have an older brother. I can’t make it because you remind me of five different people and I can’t figure out who. I can’t make it because I’m still trying to describe the way you raise your eyes before you say most things.

I can’t make it because in too dark of lighting you’ll be sitting in front of me and sink into yourself — your shoulders will lower and you’ll look downwards, visibly becoming a smaller man as you tell me about art school, attempting to humble yourself.

I can’t make it because I could’ve sworn you were a figment of my imagination — like the side of the road in the White Mountains, you’d climb into a strangers’ car and tell him about how we weren’t connected.

I can’t make it because there’s an orange streetlight falling across the road outside my bathroom window and I woke Robyn up and that conversation where I’m justifying three-year-old heartbreak is playing on repeat in my mind and my mouth is dry.

I can’t make it because of the space that exists between this summer and last — so much space it rattles me a bit. All those evenings spent running, thudding my own knees against concrete, so entirely alone, so entirely content.