Moth/Flame — A Rewatch I Pretend Is New

I took a deep breath to steady myself before rolling the ball away.\nEvery cell in my being shouting at me—\n“But what if we just stay?”\n\nFor another month.\nFor another week.\nFor another day.\n\n“What would make Kim stay?”\nEchoes of a version of you\nthat I had thought actually saw me—for me.\n\nBack when I felt like having you in my life\nwas a never-quite-spoken brag.\nBack when it felt like\nyou were someone that actually had my back.\n\nWe’re getting too old\nto keep coming back\nto play the same version of an old game—\nnever quite sure\nwho in the situation was the moth\nand which one of us was the flame.\n\nA picture that I no longer keep beside my bed,\ninside of an invisible frame.\nAt least this last chapter\nstarted and ended\nin a way that was\nunnaturally tame.\n\nNo final blow-up.\nNo last grand gesture.\nJust a soft fade—\nlike music slipping out a car window.\n\nAnd maybe that’s the part that lingers.\nNot the words we said—\nbut the ones we didn’t.\n\nI’m not rewriting the ending.\nJust rereading it slower now,\nrealizing the foreshadowing was always there—\nI just didn’t want to spoil the plot.\nAt least this time we can say that we both learned a lot.

As the heavy red curtains began their rise, you enter the set from upstage left\nBelow your feet you can see the little tape “x”—you missed the mark by half a step.\nStill, I held my breath tightly—hope frozen in my chest as if it were opening night.\nThe audience goes silent, and suddenly all we can see is you beneath the spotlight.\n\nI listen closely to the prompter feeding you the lines you seem to have forgotten.\nStanding in the wings, your costar doesn’t seem to understand what she’s caught in.\nShe delivers her lines with wide eyes and trust you didn’t earn—\nOblivious to the way you spark the fire, then leave her behind. Alone, she will burn.\n\nShe doesn’t know yet how quickly you exit the scene,\nHow you pull people close just to slip through the between.\nYou whisper like it matters, then vanish mid-line—\nNot cruel, just careless, with timing that borders on unkind.\n\nYou fumble with the props, making the most out of your indecision,\nCarefully watching the craftsmanship as your skin only faintly glistens.\nI swear I’ve seen this all before—the moment just before the tension thickens.\n\nYou bask in applause—the one you wanted so badly to return,\nStill choking on your forgotten lines. I guess you live and you learn.\nThe truth is still the truth, even if you start a fire to watch it burn—\nAnd honesty isn’t something anyone should ever have to try to earn.\n\nNow the curtains have fallen, the theater is bare,\nI’m left with the smoke and the weight of stale air.\nThe answers were props, the truth just pretend—\nAnd I’m still in my seat, waiting for the play to find its end.

Have you ever felt a touch so electric that you fall onto your knees?\nSometimes there’s more to life than it would at first appear or seem\nTwo separate rivers that always end up in confluence—one giant stream\nYou came to me a month ago, but that time it was only an unwanted dream\n\nA year spent staring out at the void, haphazardly containing my screams\nA disruption—a decade-long routine—I spent too long playing and replaying that one scene\nThe one where we both laid down our cards and decided that it was finally time to leave\nReminding me of all the times the end meant wiping tears on my own sleeve\n\nLast night I saw your face—not in a dream or a scene replaying in the eye of my mind\nA room filled with laughter, red lights shining down over your head—you and I passing time\n“Why do you always come back?” your voice filled with gravel like it was a committed crime\nThe question lingering in the air as my eyes glanced anywhere but forward—\nAverting eye contact, I tried my best to look for a symbol or some kind of sign\n\nThe answer escaping me—I thought that it was obvious—thoughts circling inside my mind\nWith a deep breath in, then a hold—our eyes met, and I wondered how much I could hide\nIf you took a second, I’m sure that it wouldn’t be incredibly difficult for you to find\nLove always existed, even if neither one of us wanted to try our best to define\n\nAnother drive beneath the star-studded sky—this time was different, your hand in mine\nCarefully planted feet walking across the tightrope—this time, are you by my side?\nI could keep running, but after a decade, it’s getting harder to keep my unsteady stride\nQuestions lingering—are you finally ready to stop hiding behind your pride?\nI could ask the question, but I don’t think either of us will ever know the real why

(Yes, it’s here too. Rewatches do that.)\n\nWhat would happen, if instead of running—we both decided to stay?\nA door we locked years ago that’s somehow now left slightly ajar.\nHow many times can we repeat the same cycle of mistakes\nbefore one decides the prize is no longer worth the cost of the stakes?\n\n“You know the definition of insanity, right?”\nMy cheeks, a vibrant scarlet, as I look at the floor.\nI could make a run for it—\nmy hand, mentally, already on the knob of the door,\nrecounting the steps I took before\nthat led us into the coldest of wars.\n\nBut what if the story never needed a plot twist,\nnever needed a war to make peace exist?\nWhat if the ending wasn’t meant to be clean—\njust two broken people choosing something unseen?\n\nAnd still, I hover in the doorway,\nunsure if staying means losing the game.\nBut maybe the real insanity\nwas thinking we ever left things the same—\nwhen neither of us ever truly leave.