Treeline at closing. A man at the corner table.
I felt him before I saw him. The same way I'd felt him the first night — a weight in the room that hadn't been there a moment before, a displacement of air, the specific gravity of a man whose presence changed the temperature of every space he entered. Except now I knew what the weight was. Now I knew the name of it and the scent of it and the way it held Neruda on a floor and poured coffee that was finally consistent and said I love you to a window before saying it to my face.
