Talking to you on the phone that one day, I was surprised, am still surprised, by how verbal you are. Curious. Hungry. Were you just being a voracious man?

Most of the men I’ve been with romantically talk a lot less than I do. I asked myself, I ask myself: Was he always that way? I can’t remember.

I remember all the things we didn’t say. That’s what our relationship back then was about. All the things we couldn’t, didn’t, say. Or do. That was our currency. That was our defualt state. All feeling, no talk. Yet you told me we spent hours on the phone as teenagers. “We talked on the phone all the time. All the time. And I don’t do that with anyone.” 20 years later and the comparison still stands? You’ve had 20 something years to find an (my) equivalent.

But I’m still not sure that what you do say—now, then—can be trusted. You are the jester in the king’s court. You learned to survive with words. To charm with them. You survive through words. Like me. But very different from me.

Crossposted with Love Dog.