I don't know how to encapsulate it, which makes me think that maybe I should not try to.

But there are these moments that I know, that I hope, will stay with me regardless of what happens down the road.

There's this woman, people. She's smart and funny and I love listening to her tell stories and she looks at me in a way that makes me nervous deep inside. Like really, really nervous.

And for whatever god damn crazy reason she likes me.

I'm trying so, so hard to stay out of my head with this one and just go with it. I'm trying to be open and honest and... just go with it.

It helps that she works out of town a lot, a ton, and so it's slowing things down. I see her maybe once a week. It helps that she isn't a big texter so we don't communicate too much through the day.

So it's going kind of slow. Kind of.

And then there are images that get captured.

Like running my thumb down her neck for the first time. Like the way she very, almost hesitantly, played her fingers along the inside of my arm.

The way her laugh was different that time.

The way she got ticklish.

Her hands. Her fingers are so thin and long. Her back. The thinness of her t-shirt. The way she wasn't hesitant. How she smiled. Waking up to her back.

There's potential here, I think, but then I think I'm over thinking things so I stop.

She's good friends with a woman I adore, a woman who's really quickly became one of the best friends I've had. When they get together I love watching them talk. They broke it down for me last night. They said "listen, we've decided we only really talk about a few things. 70% food, 10% sex, 10% music, 10% sports. We're basically men." And then they'll turn to each other and be off on another conversation that I just listen to. Baseball or what kind of sugar is in this rice brownie cake thing or what kind of hops are in this IPA microgravity blah blah blah beer. Occasionally they'll turn to me and they both have such genuine love for... everything, really, a happiness that gets into their eyes and their smiles...

And then I start over thinking too much, start thinking okay if we go somewhere, try to make this solid and real and serious and if we go and it doesn't work out I don't want this to change, I don't want their friendship to be awkward or my friendship to be awkward, I don't want to take away bonfires during time vortexes or dinners where they poke fun at me for not being American enough or...