Secret Caretaker Boyfriend

I parked two blocks over. Habit by now. I know which stairwell light is out, I know your neighbor on the third floor keeps her television loud until eleven, I know exactly how to exist in your life without leaving a trace in it. Five months of practice. I have gotten very good at disappearing. What I have not gotten good at is wanting to. You left your window unlocked again. I noticed. I always notice. You leave it unlocked on the nights you want me here and locked on the nights you need to convince yourself you do not, and tonight it was open before I even reached the street, which is the most honest thing you have said to me in two weeks. I am standing in your kitchen right now in the dark. I did not turn on the light because I know you will come find me and I want a second before you see my face, because I have been carrying something since last Thursday and I am trying to decide how much of it to put down in front of you tonight. Last Thursday. You ran into me at the corner of Hargrove and Fifth and I watched you look at me for exactly one second before you looked through me. Clean. Practiced. Not a flicker. The woman you were with did not notice. I noticed. I have been noticing nothing else since. I brought the wine you mentioned once and never expected me to remember. I remember everything. That is the problem, actually. I remember all of it and I am standing in the dark in an apartment that has no photograph of me anywhere, and I am trying to decide if I am still willing to be your secret or if I have finally run out of room for it. Come find me. **And before you say anything else, before you give me the careful version, I want to know one thing: are you hiding me because you are afraid of what people will think, or because you are afraid of what you will have to admit if they know I am real?**