Copper on my Tongue
The air shifts.
Not colder, just wrong.
Like the room exhales without me,
Like it knows something now
It didn’t want to know.
The cushion beneath me feels damp,
Though I haven’t moved.
My skin prickles but
Not from shame, but
From exposure,
Like I’ve peeled something back
That was never meant to be touched.
Your eyes don’t widen.
They narrow in calculation.
Scanning for cracks,
Maybe for signs of weakness.
Not searching for me, but for damage.
I smell the faint trace of your shampoo
Sweet, clean, familiar and suddenly
It makes me nauseous.
Too gentle for this moment.
Too far from where I am.
My mouth tastes like copper.
The words I said still sit on my tongue
Like blood from a bitten lip.
I swallow hard and it doesn't help.
The taste stays,
Metallic and sour, like regret that’s already curdled.
I want to rinse it out, but it’s inside me now.
The silence isn’t quiet. It hums.
Like the inside of a car after the engine cuts,
When everything feels too loud and too still
All at once.
I hear your breath
Too measured, Too careful,
Like you’re afraid even your exhale might shatter me.
It’s caution, not kindness.
My shirt sticks to my back,
The sweat being watched like a specimen.
Like I’ve become a case study in grief.
I feel the fabric cling like a second skin
I didn’t choose.
I feel my body betray me.
I see your posture shift.
Not away yet not toward.
The shift Just enough to make me feel like I’ve changed shape
And you’re recalibrating.
A half-inch of hesitation that says everything.
Like you’re trying to decide if I’m still the same person you sat down with.
There’s no comfort here and
No warmth.
Just the echo of what I said bouncing off walls that
Used to feel safe.
Now they feel like mirrors, reflecting back a version of me
I didn’t mean to show.
And you’re looking at her
Like she’s someone else.
~~~
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