It is unpaid labour I do in my head. If he wanted to, that message would already be sitting right there.
I have given this more poetry than it has earned. Busy. Bad at texting. Needs space. Phone died. Work is mad. All of those can be true once. After that they are a costume.
A grown man who can find a cab at 2am can find a sentence before Thursday.
The job I did not apply for
Here is what the silence actually is. I send something normal. Not a novel. Not a trap. How was your day, or that place was good, or I am on earlies so Friday is better.
Then I wait. Then I become self employed in a company of one. Head office is my pillow. Duties include rereading my own message for crimes. Checking if the ticks mean anything. Building three versions of him. One is dead in a ditch, which is dramatic and still kinder than the true one, which is on his phone and simply not bothered.
That is unpaid labour. I am writing his intentions for him. I am managing his image so I do not have to feel like I was an option. I am doing the emotional admin he could have cleared with four words.
Saw this. Want to see you. Cannot this week. Not feeling it. All usable. None of them require a degree.
I know how phones work. So does he
We live in a city where people answer a group chat about bin night from a club toilet. He can reply to his mate about football in the time it takes me to put mascara on. He can post. He can watch a story. He can be very present for the internet and very missing for me.
Do not tell me he is bad at texting like it is a medical condition. He is bad at texting me. That is a preference. Treat it like one.
I am not talking about one slow afternoon. I work. I have a floor to run. I have left people on read because a pallet was wrong and my hands were full. That is a delay. A delay comes with a later. What I am talking about is the pattern. Hot on Saturday. Fog by Monday. A little spark on Wednesday so I do not delete the thread. That is not a full diary. That is keeping a light on so I stay warm.
Mystery is just good lighting on a no
We do this thing where we make absence interesting. He is deep. He is independent. He is not like the needy ones. Meanwhile I am on the night bus writing a biography of a man who has not spent ten seconds on me.
I used to like that story. It made the wanting feel expensive. If it was simple he would be here, so the delay must mean I matter in some complicated way. That is a lie I sold myself because the truth is thinner. I was convenient when he was bored and heavy when he had to choose.
Quiet men still make my stomach drop. I know why. Silence in a house taught me to fill it. I will invent a whole weather system rather than sit in the gap. Dating found that bruise and pressed it with read receipts.
The romantic version says he is careful. The real version says I am doing extra shifts in my own head so I do not have to call it rejection.
If he wanted to, the bar is on the floor
I am not asking him to write letters. I am not asking for good morning every day like a hostage situation. I am asking for the same energy he gives to anything he actually wants. A table booked. A time. A reply that does not need a decoder ring.
People online love to complicate this until it sounds cruel. Men are shy. Men are busy. Men do not think like that. Fine. Then he can be shy, busy, and still type I am keen, Thursday, 7. If he cannot manage that after he has already had my time, my mouth, my night, he is not overwhelmed. He is under invested.
I can accept a no. I would rather the no. A no lets me put my face on and go to work. A maybe that lasts six days turns me into a girl who checks her phone between pallets. I hate her. She is still me.
What I do instead of waiting like a spare part
I send it once. Then I live. Telly. Shower. The flat. A shift. I do not send the second message that explains the first. That second one is me begging the silence to be kinder than it is.
If he comes back three days later with sorry mate chaos, I look at the whole week, not the apology. Chaos that only lands on me is not chaos. It is ranking.
I still slip. I still draft. I still catch myself writing a joke that is really a hook. I am not above it. I am just bored of calling it chemistry when it is me entertaining myself so I do not feel discarded.
The promotion I want will not come from a man who cannot operate WhatsApp. Neither will the boyfriend I pretend I do not want. Both of those need someone who can stand a bit of daylight. A reply is daylight. It is not romance. It is proof he exists in the same day I do.
Stop making it cinematic
He is not a closed book. He is a person with thumbs. If the thumbs work for everyone else and die in my chat, that is the answer. You can like him anyway. You can still want the night. Just do not dress the gap up as depth.
Depth would be him saying he is rubbish at this and then getting slightly less rubbish. Depth would be I liked Saturday and I do not want more. Depth would be anything that does not require me to hold both sides of the conversation in my skull at 1am.
I have a life that already asks enough. Rent. Rota. Two flatmates. A face I have to rebuild every morning. I will not keep a part time job as his narrator.
If he wanted to, that message would already be sitting there. If it is not, I am putting the phone down and letting the silence be what it is. Not a riddle. Not a film. Just a man who did not bother.
