A Dance for Unrequitement

A story about nothing happening.

 

We danced lightly around each other.

I was afraid to touch, afraid to look too long, or to be caught in one of those awkward unconscious stares in which I admired some feature of yours I found particularly striking that day. They took turns, your features. Whether your hair or your eyes or your smile or that particular expression you were wearing right then there was always something dangerous for my eyes to trip over. They had to step carefully in the spaces behind and above you, wandering in the paths between.

Did you ever really know?

I spent hours haunted by the question. It made all the difference, you see. If you knew, and you still smiled, if you knew and we still danced lightly, if you knew and you hadn't acted... then you knew, and you forgave me for loving you.

Knowing would be hard, but knowing I could move on.

It was the unknowing that paralyzed me. The possibilities if you didn't know...

If you didn't know, were you as tortured as me? Were we swaying in tune when we could have been waltzing? Were we keeping our distance because like magnets we threatened to draw too close?

It was dancing that started it all. I made eye contact with you when you were a stranger, and I was suddenly bolder than I had ever been before. In that laughing clumsy dance, you watched me, but I was free. Then later, a questioning look that you promptly answered. It was in that second dance that you snared me.

If you didn't know... would finding out stop the smiles? The music would die and even our contactless stepping would have to end. There would be no more secret stolen glances and tiny excited flutterings. The delicate dance would shatter like glass, the way my heart did every time another small hope was destroyed.

The music plays on, but it's winding down. The clock will strike midnight soon.

The ball will end, the illusion will fade, but my slippers will stay firmly on my fleeing feet. The only magic here is in the mystery. This is not my fairy tale.

Reviews

[Kathleen]

"It was the unknowing that paralyzed me." Isn't that the truth? You capture in words the feelings that so many people face when entering a potential new relationship. The joys. The fears. The antagonizing not knowing. Thank you for sharing.
-Kathleen

[Genie]

What a melodic voice you have here! The writing is crafted in such a way that it is like the dancing you describe so well and wistfully. Reminds me of a poem or two I've written, but I like yours much better!

[Siddartha Beth Pierce]

What a lovely story...captures that feeling of intimacy one feels unexplained for another as if you have known them before...the longing is quite evident and wonderfully expressed. Enjoy the dance. Thank you for sharing.
Light,
Siddartha