Seven More Times
By Rina Palumbo
I will only see you seven more times. I know this. You do not.
This is the sixth-to-last time I will ever see you. I am suddenly aware of things that may have been beneath the surface, the new wrinkle between your eyes, the tension in your mouth. And how you have the softest and warmest lips I have ever kissed.
This is the fifth-to-last time I will ever see you. You are mad at me for something. I know you want to fight to release that anger. I am tempted, as always, by the intensity inside of you; I like to fight to feel that energy, feed it with the intensity inside of me. But I am sad because I know something you don't. I have already bought a ticket to another city. My sadness wins; my intensity can't match yours today.
This is the fourth-to-last time I will ever see you. You are at work, and I visit you in your office where you wish I wouldn't come. I have an excuse, but you are still nervous someone will see us and figure everything out. We sit there, you in your chair, me on the other side of your desk. I give you the work you asked for. You open the folder and begin to read, and all I can see is how the button on your shirt is unbuttoned, exposing your neck. I want to kiss that spot, but I know I can't. You dismiss me.
This is the third to last time you will ever see me. We do everything we do together, and I almost regret my decision. Almost. But I've already signed a lease for an apartment in that other city. I only have a few things to move as I've sold some and given others away. I like that feeling of getting rid of things.
This is the second to last time you will ever see me. I would also like to be with you. The way it was in the beginning. Before it was all about the future, or at least the future you planned for us. That beginning of us, those were the best days. I will miss them more than I will miss you.
This is the last time we will see each other. I'll finally tell you. And as I tell you, I know I will never kiss that spot on your neck or your lips again, and I notice that tension around your mouth is lessening, as is the wrinkle on your brow between your eyes. You are relieved and maybe happier, too. Or at least, that is the story I will tell, now that we will never see each other again.
Rina Palumbo (she/her) is working on a novel and two nonfiction long-form writing projects alongside short fiction, creative nonfiction, and prose poetry. Her work appears in The Hopkins Review, Ghost Parachute, Milk Candy, Bending Genres, Anti-Heroin Chic, Identity Theory, Stonecoast Review, et al.
