Same number waiting. Still I open the app again. Hope is a stupid habit. So is thinking some random transfer is about to appear tonight.
Tag: anxiety
No map, no group chat, no cab app. Just mascara and hope. A dead battery is how a cute night turns into a survival plot.
Times, trains, whose house after. I look organised. I am just frightened of being left in a doorway with nowhere to put this tired face.
Unavailable is not mysterious. It is unpaid labour I do in my head. If he wanted to, that message would already be sitting right there.
Bags by the door, uniform waiting, that low familiar dread. Even if the weekend was messy, the Monday reset feels like being marched straight back.
Nice people go quiet. The group chat dries right up. Then the money leaves and we are mates again. Poverty makes all our manners seasonal.
I tell myself the promotion ends the tight feeling for good. It will help. It will not make me suddenly wise on a Friday night.
Not sex this time. An actual argument. I put music on and hated myself for listening. Thin walls make you an unpaid bloody little witness.
I feel flush one stupid evening. The app opens and the glow dies. Hope is not a budget. It is a hobby I cannot even afford.
Not always, but often enough to notice the pattern. Body against body and the day shuts up. It works until I get fully dressed again.