Half Lit Hallways

You’ve been speaking to me

like someone keeping a door cracked open

just enough for me to stand in the cold

and still believe I’m welcome.

Lately your words feel shorter,

your silence louder.

Like being your friend

became something heavy

the moment I started acting like one back.

And maybe I understand it.

I’m the bad part of your story,

the friend that existed

in the space between breakups,

the person who helped hold your heart together

just long enough

for you to hand it back to him.

But if that’s true,

why keep calling my name?

Why tell me things

in that voice you know I’ll answer softly to?

You know how I love people.

So why does it suddenly feel

like I’m being punished

for caring exactly the way you know me to?

I can handle distance.

I can handle space.

But being made to feel like a burden

for simply trying to be your friend

is the part that breaks me quietly.