Sample: the friend you're losing to silence

One of the shapes a straight-talk letter takes. Names cut, private things left out. If it sounds like someone you know, that's the point.


Hey. I'm not going to pretend this is casual, because it isn't.

We used to talk like it cost nothing. Now every message I draft sounds like it costs everything, so it stays in drafts. I don't want to lose you to my own silence, so here's the whole thing, no padding:

I miss you. Not the idea of you. You, mid-sentence, at an hour you weren't supposed to still be awake. I don't know if something changed, or everything did, slowly, in a way neither of us caught. If I did something, I'd rather hear it than keep guessing. If it's just life, say that too, and I'll stop bracing for a goodbye every time a week goes quiet.

I'm not asking for a big conversation. I'm asking that we don't let silence decide it. One word back is enough.


That's the shape: the thing you can't say, said straight, with a small door held open at the end.

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