You closed the door. Then turned the handle gently, as if goodbyes still needed some small touch of ceremony. Before that, your fingers slipped from mine— like someone loosening a knot they never meant to tie. The coffee cooled upon the tray before your voice had faded. Your silence crossed the hallway just before your steps betrayed it. And in the kitchen, your gaze let go of mine, moments before it failed to understand. I walk the road we left behind, each step returns what time erased. Your voice grows clearer in my mind— a ghost with no remorse or haste. I meet you where we never met, before the pain, before regret. A letter unsigned appeared upon the pillow a week before you'd written the pain between its lines. Your ashes of complaint returned to glowing embers— one cigarette relit, then two, then none remembered. We undid a train-bound trip to nowhere in particular. The suitcases unfilled themselves in stations bright with future. Our songs fell silent, and with them went the vows we used to whisper at red lights when no one else was near. I walk the road we left behind, each step returns what time erased. Your voice grows clearer in my mind— a ghost with no remorse or haste. I meet you where we never met, before the pain, before regret. Your tears withdrew before they reached your cheeks. Your voice regained the steel it had that spring. Your shoes were once again left near the door, and didn’t scare us. Fatigue flew out the window before it learned our names. And then— you smile at me in passing, as if no pages turned. You lean into the first kiss with that sacred, awkward grace that once felt like fate. We go back to not knowing what names we wore, and I— to seeing you for the first time. I walk the road we left behind, each step returns what time erased. Your voice grows clearer in my mind— a ghost with no remorse or haste. I meet you where we never met, before the pain, before regret. And farther still, you’re not yet real. No story’s been begun. No echo of your voice has touched my name. Just me, reading some forgotten book on an unrecorded afternoon, waiting—unaware— for the tragedy that starts with someone smiling. I walk the road we left behind, each step returns what time erased. Your voice grows clearer in my mind— a ghost with no remorse or haste. I meet you where we never met, before the pain, before regret.
