living with someone — without living with someone — is growing on me.

i have my space, he has his. mine, fitted with antiques and pelts and apple twigs and fresh cut flowers. his, bedecked with vintage art, mid century modern furniture, vinyl records, house plants, with just a wall between our little, symmetrical universes.

we visit each other, almost on a daily basis. his gold subaru outback will pull into the dirt lot next to my own vehicle and i’ll peek out the sliders to watch him haul something out of his car. a $40 chive plant, another painting, his compost bin. from twenty yards, his bright blond hair is hard to miss.

i’ll hear him trudge up the hallway stairs and a set of keys jingle in the lock. he’ll bump around in his unit and turn on some sweet jazz tunes, and then a light knock on my door.

“hey, wanna have some wine?”

our fingertips touch when he hands me a glass (an etched romanian thrift store find) and i don’t draw away. we watch tiger king and smoke a joint, and while he clumsily tries to tune a guitar, i can’t help but want to find his mouth with mine.

i don’t… not yet.