We Loved Each Other Somewhere Else
I dream of you
in places we never stood
never breathed the same air
never learned the shape of each other’s shadows.
You show up in borrowed cities,
corners of my sleep stitched together
with details my waking life never earned.
We’re leaning against a bus stop
that smells like rain and rusted metal,
your shoulder warm like it’s always known mine.
Neon signs flicker behind you
in a language I don’t speak,
but somehow I understand the way you look at me
like we’re already mid-conversation,
like I didn’t miss years of you.
Sometimes it’s a motel off a highway
neither of us has driven.
Peeling paint, ice machine screaming in the distance,
the room buzzing with that low electrical loneliness.
You’re barefoot on the carpet,
laughing softly like this place isn’t temporary,
like we didn’t borrow this moment from nothing.
I dream of us in grocery aisles
somewhere unfamiliar
you comparing fruit,
holding it up to the light like you’re judging the sun.
Our hands almost touch
and the air goes tight,
charged,
like the universe paused to see
if I’d finally be brave enough
to exist beside you.
And the worst part
the most beautiful part
is how natural it feels.
Like we’ve done this before
in a life that didn’t make it to daylight.
Like my body remembers you
even when my memory has no proof.
When I wake up,
my room feels like a set after the actors left.
The ceiling too quiet.
The walls unfamiliar again.
I reach for my phone
knowing damn well
there’s no timestamp,
no message,
no evidence you were ever there.
Just the ache.
That soft, persistent hunger
of having lived a whole life with you
somewhere unreachable.
I miss you
in cities that don’t know my name.
In rooms we never ruined.
In moments that only exist
when my eyes are closed.
And every morning,
I wake up carrying the weight
of something beautiful
that never got the chance
to disappoint me.