insider trading

I didn’t go to bed on Sunday night because of a boy from London. When I heard London, my ears perked up and my attention remained on him searching for an accent. There was none. He’s American, but a boy who loves London is a boy I could listen to. And he had kind eyes.

We stayed up- a group of us –until the sun came up. I watched green appear on the trees outside the window as I squinted against the increasing light. The notion of sleep was silly. I was still reworking all the words, all the questions, all the answers.

We turned the night into generalizations that turned personal. It started easily and innocently with a hypothetical, a question about what lies behind the curtain of a boy’s mind. He spilled all the secrets, said he shouldn’t be divulging so much. We ate up every word, hung on them.

“Why him and not me,” he asked at one point.

“It’s just a personal choice. It’s like why her and not me,” I replied.

“OK. I get it,” he said and with that I let him go, but we kept talking, almost endlessly about everything.

“I’m sensitive, but straight,” he cautioned us.

“I’m quoting you on that one.” He didn’t know how serious I was. I thought about leaving him my card- an arrow to this blog- a window inside my head. I hinted all night to him, but we had entered the friend zone. I could have- so many times- just slipped in beside him, turned his face to mine. I didn’t- claiming all the insecurities he had released in his conversations. In three hours I knew more about his heart, his feelings, his fears of love than I know about my closest friends. And that felt good. And he made me laugh. With his frankness and openness. I wish that I had said more to him than “bye,” in the morning- more than, “Have fun in London.”