Closing The Gap She was a friend of a friend of a friend, and there were no loose ties anywhere between, and though that was the closest distance between us, in the end it didn’t matter. We closed the gap.

That night was a first for me. I had never stayed over at a woman’s home before; never held someone in that unfamiliar way in an unfamiliar room. Months later, the embrace was over. I took my arms from around her, pushed her away, and made the gap as wide as my arms could reach. It was the wrong thing to do, and I realized this long before the next time we spoke, years later. She came over one night and stayed much too late. We fell asleep, innocently, in my room. I remember the gap that was between us then and I wondered why I couldn’t bring myself to hold her when we’d been so close in the past. This thought lingered in my mind until finally I put my arm over hers and pulled us into a familiar embrace.

Since that night, we haven’t spoken more than to be polite. It bothers me that it ended this way, but I understand. Our lives were destined to run in other directions and cross only once, although we tried to sway them back towards each other. And that gap was always supposed to be there, wide enough only to fit the moments that have already passed by.  ¶ 8:13 AM