I Like Your Name Because It Rhymes with the Moon

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I like your name because it rhymes with the moon. Do you even know mine? Or am I just the barista who's too young to be writing you love letters? I like your name so much, I remind people how to say it just to say it more. Did you ever tell anybody mine? Or was it just a happening—an encounter in passing—that I admired you from afar before I admired you from across the table.

I remember that your birthday is August 23rd, which makes you a Virgo, a virgin woman. Mine is March 9th and I'm a Pisces, two fish in one. Your favorite flower is baby's breath, which I find to be unique. Mine is a marigold, if you ever wondered. 

I know that you're sensitive. You don't like reminiscing about good times because they're gone. You tear up when you miss your family, I saw it. And sometimes, you feel like you're behind—like you're not where you should be in life. I think you hide behind self-development because you're scared to be seen vulnerable. But that's what makes you artistic, what makes you creative. Even off-camera, I know your confidence. For what it's worth, I think you're exactly where you're supposed to be. Your life is so beautiful, even if your future is uncertain. You're not behind, you're just in a different time zone—both in a literal and figurative sense. 

When I never heard back from you, I didn't know what I should feel. Angry? Disappointed? Indifferent? So I settled for being sad. I wish you made my heart cold. If you actually cared, if we were actually something tangible, maybe it would be. Talking to you was a breath of fresh air—the kind you take in, not the kind you gasp for. We talked, we talked more—then it vanished into thin air, the same air I breathed. I didn't think I'd miss it this much, but I guess you don't appreciate air until you're drowning in ambiguity. 

I respect myself too much to let it consume me, but I don't think I could ever not wonder about you. I wonder about your career search, about how it is being back with your family after years apart. When Katseye released their new single, I almost texted you. But you didn't respond to my last two texts and I didn't want to look even more pathetic. I saw BTS live and I wanted to send you the compilation I made of Tae and JK goofing around on stage. I had to stop looking at your channel because that also felt pathetic. You'll be happy to know your videos find a way into my feed regardless. I didn't click "not interested" because then I'd be lying to myself, and I didn't block you because you did nothing wrong. You're forever in my algorithm, and I'm not talking about social media. 

I like your name because before I learned it, I just called you "Large, hot Americano—" which, without context, sounds really weird. What I like most about your name, though, is that it's your name. Yours to give meaning to. I just thought—hoped, really—that I'd get to know that meaning—get to know you. But I was a happening, a passing moment—a memory you rejected. I was seen briefly, then quietly forgotten. From afar to across to afar again. 

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