The Silent Conspiracy

Have you ever wept over something I've written? Your eyes filled with tears once; you didn't lie about it. That piece—the very words I've never spoken to a soul in this world. We were unlucky that day; we didn't meet.

Since then, every time we've crossed paths, you've called to me in some nameless dread, sensing the stir of dark omens pressed deep within. You really could have kept me alive.

I know all of this is a kind of effort. Why do you want my love, yet won't declare it? And yet you know—nature has left us a way to ignore even such rules—to fade away in silence, without a trace. It's like some strange collusion between yourself and yourself.

Does love survive for nothing? All that restlessness you fell into—is that what fear of loss feels like? I know too well which word to place after which to make you tremble. All this time I've been writing about you; surely you understand that much.

Love has the strangest law, you see—one person must lose, one-sidedly. Between two of you, there's no certainty which one bears this burden.

Perhaps I've returned to the times that came before.