I’m ready

I’m ready.

It’s been long enough.

The hurt has gone, the pain is in the past.

I’m settled, happy, content, hopeful.

I’m ready.
Ready to meet her.

The person who is out there,

Right now,

Living her life not knowing I exist.
The places we will see! The food we will eat! The laughs we will share!

Neither of us know now, but it will be glorious.

We will fill gaps in our lives that we don’t even know we have,

Soon wondering how we ever felt happy without them in our lives.

We will be perfect.

If we meet.
I don’t need to find them right now but I want to.

I swipe.

I swipe again.

I swipe forever.

And then I swipe some more.

A match! A bloody match!
We chat. We flirt a little.

For a day.

Then she goes silent.

She wasn’t the one.
I swipe again.

Endless faces smiling at the camera with friends

And pets

On a yacht

Skiing

Drinking

Up a mountain

A thousand versions of the same face.
A match!

We chat. We flirt.

I mention I have kids.

She goes silent.

She wasn’t the one.
I repeat. Once. Twice. A hundred times.

Opening messages becoming standard.

Only so many times you can be utterly original, and even then they’ve heard it all before.

Replies becoming formulaic.
“I love travelling too, where’s the best place you’ve been?”

“I love dancing, can you salsa?”

“Last meal would definitely be a full English breakfast”

“Only just starting my gin journey, any tips?”
I’m boring myself.
Wait, this one is different.

We flirt a little.

We flirt a lot.

When I see messages from her I smile.

She out gif’s me.

I think I’m in love.
No, stop it, don’t be stupid!

You’re doing it again.

Leaping before you look,

Hoping before you should.

Chill. The. Fuck. Out.
But what if……
NO! STOP IT!

You’ve been here before. Countless times.

You know the cycle.

You chat. You flirt. You meet. You realise within minutes that there’s no future.

Put your walls up.

Protect yourself.
But what if……
NO! STOP IT!

Walls up. For your own good.
Only, she’s got her walls up too.

They look high.

Insurmountable.

She’s been hurt before.

She’ll never love again.

Her walls are too high.

Not worth even trying to scale them.
So you don’t, never knowing that she was waiting for someone to try.

That she saw your own walls and felt the same.

Two people, both ready, both hoping, both protecting.
And now both swiping again.
I’m ready.

I think.