Before it becomes something

[u/kopila92]

We have learned to leave
before anyone asks us to.
To call it casual
before we have to call it care.
To say I’m good on my own
while checking if they’ve read the message.
We have learned the language
of almost:
almost together,
almost honest,
almost brave enough
to ask what this is.
We keep things undefined
so there’s room to hope
and room to deny
that we ever did.
The moment something begins to matter,
we start looking for the ending.
A slower reply.
A change in tone.
One uncertain sentence
we can use as a reason
to disappear first.
Because pain feels easier
when we can pretend
we chose it.
So we practice self-preservation.
We call it self-protection.
We hold our hearts back
as if distance could guarantee
they won’t be hurt.
But the moment we feel something,
we can reject it
before we explore it.
We can turn away
before asking what the feeling means,
before learning who this person is,
before finding out
what the two of us might make
if neither of us runs.
We tell ourselves
we’re protecting our hearts.
But sometimes
we’re only closing the door
before we find out
who might have stayed
or who we might have become
if we had stayed, too.
Maybe love asks for this much courage:
not a promise that we won’t be hurt,
not certainty about where it will lead,
just the willingness to feel something
without rejecting it
before we’ve even explored
what it could become.

[u/Mnkey-D-Luffy]

We have to realize at the end of the time there is real person