Letter #1

Praque: The woman who never stays

I shouldn’t be writing this.

Not after that night. Not after leaving you with nothing but my name and every reason not to follow.

And yet I keep thinking about the way you watched me across the bar—not with the hopeful hunger of men who want to be noticed, but with the patience of someone who had already decided how the evening would end.

I told myself I was immune to it. I told myself a hundred things, in that stubborn, quiet way I have when I want to believe I still control my narrative. But something in me settled into it, the way a cat finds a patch of sun.

I was alone, as I always am at first, posted at the farthest edge of the counter. You were not. Your friends made a show of being loud and amused, but the only thing I remember about them is that you seemed separate even in their company. I noticed you early—the particular way you held your glass, not drinking so much as considering it. I made a point of not looking twice. You waited until after midnight to approach, after I had closed my tab and pulled my coat over my shoulders, the first signal that the evening was over for me. I had already planned my steps: the walk back to my hotel, the silence of the elevator, the cool sheets and the city’s lights flickering through the curtains.

Instead, you appeared beside me the way people do in dreams, already there before you arrived. I could feel the heat of your presence at my back, the clean chemistry of you closing in. You asked if I had enjoyed my evening. Not whether I was alone, not whether I wanted another drink. I laughed—the kind that escaped before you can decide whether to let it. You smiled slowly when it did, your eyes lingered on my mouth as if you were already imagining how it would feel against yours.

We stepped out into the city together, which surprised us both. We walked, and the city granted us a kind of privacy: no one lingered, no one followed, the air cooling but not cold, my skin just aware of how close you were. At the crosswalk, a light changed and you steadied me with a hand at my elbow—a courteous gesture but more intimate than it should be. I let it linger, let myself notice how your touch vibrated up my arm, a message in a language I hadn’t spoken in too long.

When we reached the hotel, I should have said goodnight and disappeared, but I turned and kissed you instead. Not a gentle kiss, not a test. That kind of kiss that writes its own memory in the nerves, a kiss that knows it’s an ending before either of us knows what is beginning.

Your hands, uncertain at first, found my face, then the back of my neck, and the space between us closed like a held breath finally released. The warmth of your mouth, the soft violence of your wanting, the trembling edge of restraint about to fray. You leaned me back into the marble of the hotel’s entryway, my spine arching, so the line of my body is flush with yours, and for a moment I can feel every small surrender in the set of your shoulders, the way you held me like a secret you’re terrified to lose. I felt you shiver as my thigh slid between yours, your breath hitching against my neck.

I could feel the full weight of what you were trying not to do, and I pressed closer, letting myself imagine the rest of it—your hands losing their patience, the sounds you would make, what it would feel like to take that from you.

I wanted it so badly I ached—but I made myself pull away, leaving us both wanting.

I could not let this happen - I let you go.

You gave me your business card. I kept it, though I had no intention of writing. And yet, here I am, unable to stop thinking about the things your hands never did.

You will want to know why I left, and why I am writing now. The answer is the same for both. I would rather you understood me before you decide whether you could bear me—not after. It has been a long time since I offered anyone that much.

Consider this a warning, or a gift. I hope you will know what to do with it.

—
The woman who never stays