Late Night Thoughts | Did you like her in the morning?

Before the sun creeps beyond the curtains, do you think of her?

Before the morning breeze glides through your skin; before the soft pain of breathing in the dewy air; the sunlight burning away all your sins—do your eyes still look for her?

You hate coffee. Feeling the strong aroma burning your lungs—the thick, hot, putrid smell that squeezes all the air out of your body, and the strong taste of pure cacao beans—you hated coffee.

I watched you laugh with her, cold coffee in hand. I watched you smell the aroma that you once hated—watching your body go stiff once it starts burning your lungs. You hated it, but she was worth burning for.

Funny.

How something you hated became something you could hold,

if it meant holding her.

For so long, I carried this ache.

For so long, I’ve waited.

Soft words that died out in my mouth, turning sour and sharp—I swallowed them like pills, letting them slowly pierce my heart.

It would be easier this way. It would be easier to watch you be happy, be in love.

However, it would be much easier if she wasn’t your last.

She smells like coffee, and I smell like citrus.

Her scent lingers—it's light and stifling. You breathe it in whilst looking at me with heavy eyes.

Your hands would find her hair, kissing and inhaling her scent that you hate. The moonlit sky weeps solemnly—its tears forming the glowing dots that you admire with her.

You said she's your everything, your first and your last.

I hoped that you looked at me with the same lenses—the same eyes that you used to look at me.

Love is a ritual that I cannot perform. I suffered the ache that gnaws in my bones, the churning of my heart, and the rewiring of my veins. I swallowed my confessions—watching helplessly as you bask in her presence, knowing that I cannot compete.

The ache, I can no longer bear. My chest tightens, lungs gasping for air, my bones ready to collapse.

You worshiped her; I loved you.

The moonlight spills harshly across the floor, barely illuminating the truth—asking once again:

“Did you ever like her in the morning?”

Do you prefer holding her cold hands while mine are warm?

As the saying goes, “The man who yearns earns the most,” but we both lost what we were trying to earn.