Almost.

I like her— God, I like her so much it hurts. Nicole—her name sounds like sunlight, soft and certain, slipping through the dull edges of my day. She’s not just pretty— she’s ethereal, the kind of beautiful that makes you quiet, that makes you want to pray to something you don’t believe in. Her laughter blooms like spring, her mind shines like dawn. And when she speaks, I forget where to place my hands. But she’s straight. And I’m a girl. That truth sits heavy, like rain that never learns how to stop. I stand beside the boys who love her, feeling smaller than I already am, counting all the ways they’re allowed to want her. Sometimes I wonder— if the stars were softer, if the world were kinder, if I were someone else— would she look at me the way I look at her? Would she see me, really see me, beneath the trembling and the almost? But I know better. This love is meant to stay quiet, pressed between heartbeats, folded into the corners of my chest. I do not need her to love me back— I only need her to smile, to live, to keep being light. So I will love her from the edges of her world, in silence, in softness. Because even if she never looks my way, she has already taught me how beautiful it is to feel.