The first time my friend shared her girl on girl daydreams 

​

with me my entire body went numb. 

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I let myself pretend just for a moment, that I could be openly gay

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without being OPEN about BEING gay. 

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I let her stories consume me, let them take control of my pulse and the

 

edges of my grin and every single nerve in me. 

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She asked me if I could ever picture myself loving another female.

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I laughed, rolled my eyes – whose gaze had traveled from her thighs,

 

passed her caved stomach, to the creases of her perfect smile – and

 

shook my head. 

​

“That’s gay,” I’d say with such roughness that it made my entire body

 

sore.  

​

She’d bite her lip and take in the staleness of my words. 

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Then, after a moment of silence, she’d ask me to tell her about the boy I

 

imagined kissing. 

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My thoughts race to my cover story, 

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the one I made up every few weeks about a boy I found noticeably cute

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but

 

would never date because his personality was too dry, or I didn’t

 

like the way he ate pasta, or the fact that he called croutons “little

 

breads"

 

I’d tell her about him, convincing her that I could never love anything as

 

feminine as her. 

 

Lie upon lie I buried myself in everything but her skin.

 

She’d always tell me how much she hated liars. 

 

I wonder how she would react if she knew her best friend was the bane

 

of her existence.  

 

I could never resist a pretty smile.

 

I could never resist her smile. 

 

And sometimes, when she smiled at me, I almost forgot how to think

 

straight.