...My Bed. NY, NY.

Something about the clear glass pane of your new screen door mixes with the dark black paint of your old front door to form a perfect mirror.

I stood there, the quietest thing on the block it seemed. I could hear cars rolling by on streets I couldn't even see. A dog was barking somewhere in the distance... chasing a cat. I think I pictured it as a black cat, and the dog as being one of those big burly bulldogs, like from the cartoons. I could hear water flushing in the sewers and I could hear the gentle click and flicker of the streetlamp at the foot of your driveway. This was a beautiful little suburb.

You'd gone inside to... what? It's so long now that some things are like the lines of a far off novel. I saw myself reflected in the glass, my leather jacket, one size too small, but I thought it looked cool somehow, the way my shirt protruded from my coat sleeves.

I thought that maybe, at that moment, I looked older, maybe it was the jacket, maybe the fact that I hadn't shaved in a while lent something to it... maybe it was you. You were definitely older. What the hell did you see in me?

I tried to see it. My eyebrows were overgrown. I looked like a smoker. Maybe that was it... my smoker's appearance. You were inside, though, I remember, and I heard your footsteps, your heel clicks, through the door even... or, wait, your living room window was open just a crack, to let in a touch of the cool night air, I suppose. Your heels clicked up the stairs I could only imagine and into some empty bedroom where he was... asleep? I assume he was a deep sleeper.

I stepped over to the driveway and took a seat on the hood of the Prius. His, I assume. You were never big on issues. But that's okay, you had other draws. You were smart, jesus christ you were smart, but... just differently. You didn't care about politics not because you didn't understand it, but because you saw it as a system outside of your control and not worth your time. The hood gave a small crunch under my weight, the way that the old Saturn used to do, with its plastic frame.

From where I was, I could spot the light coming on in your bathroom and I had one of those moments where I saw a whole set of possibilities unfolding. I saw you flushing the toilet and waking someone... the kid maybe... or even worse, him... and then it would be over. I knew that. It wasn't the end of the world, it would just mean no sex that night, which... to a 20 year old feels like the end of the world somehow.

But, it didn't. End. The world kept turning. The light went off, and then others went on and off, following you through the house like a trail of Christmas lights. You came outside and closed the door, and it was as if you were the only thing in the world. Nothing else even sounded. Your heels played down the walk and your lipstick, newly minted, kissed me from across the way. You were so fucking sexy and you knew it.

"Did you give him a kiss goodnight?" I said.

"You're so fucking stupid sometimes," you said back, walking down and getting into the car.

I stood there and stared at your doorway.

I wonder sometimes if part of me still lives in the space between the screen and the door; if some orphaned reflection lingers, looking out on that empty street, waiting for another consequential sunrise.