Aman Basra

I can see it in your eyes. Just consider my proposition and don’t leave. Let your inhibition recede and please, stay here with me.

He looks at me now, knowing fully I have brushed aside his caution. There’s no going back now; we know it. He orders more drinks and we move between each other’s tales. At this point, the contents become blurred because the damage was already done. He had my intrigue and curiosity and I was fully entrenched into his story.

She looks up and finally spots me. She waves me over as I hurry towards over. There’s too much enthusiasm, too much excitement for proper welcoming exchanges.

The new cities you dream of won’t solve anything. They too are restless and lonely. It’s not as adventurous or as novel as you may imagine. The constructs you have created, the expectations you have foolishly upheld, will only make you disappointed when you realize what awaits you.

I hardened. So much that I never really opened up to you. I think you met me amidst a transition. I am not sure who I was when our paths first crossed.

It’s the apology I was never able to give you in the moment when it mattered the most.

It’s the dreams you never had the courage to follow, it’s the lies you tell yourself as an adult.

There’s something different about today. There’s something off-putting and bothersome. You can sense it in the emergence of your annoyance and impatience.

We’re the manifestations of what antidepressants promise but can never achieve.

Your sadness remains unexplained and that’s what makes you feel worse. It’s the morning dread that extends into an all day affair.

Three signifies the amount of chances I give to people.

What does it even mean to “outgrow” someone? Shouldn’t we grow together if anything?

I am here, unfeigned by your trials and mistakes because I accept you, every fragmented part.

Like us, this city is young and with infancy comes many shortcomings and uncertainties.

The people we must keep are not the ones who always appear.

She isn’t exclusively whole but she exists in fragmented parts.

When I first told you I wrote, you looked at me and laughed. What are you going to even do with that? I don’t know, I replied.

Is it easier this way? Is it easier to just fade without a warning?