She only smokes when she’s spiraling or performing.
Usually both.
Says she loves a dramatic flourish—
exhales like a closing line,
laughs like a scratched record.
You’ll meet her at a party that’s already ending.
She'll kiss you like she’s trying to delete her own mouth,
like you’re just the eraser.
She'll leave before sunrise
because she hates how the light arrives slowly,
and can’t stand watching the world wake up
and not call her back.
If you ask what she’s looking for,
she’ll point at the exit sign and say,
“Something with the same glow.”
You’ll think she’s flirting,
but she’s actually just listening hard
for the next excuse to leave.
If you ask for her number,
she’ll give you a poem,
one with no punctuation
and a key taped to the back.
Not to her place.
To your undoing.
She tells stories like she’s double-daring
the past to contradict her.
Someone once told her
she seems like the kind of girl
who disappears mid-sentence.
She said,
“Only when the sentence forgets I started it.”
She collects promises like matchbooks:
already scorched,
still reeking of places
that almost got her to stay.
At dinner parties,
she compliments your cutlery
then slices the conversation open.
Asks what you hate most about your mother
before the bread hits the table.
You’ll want to know her real name.
She’ll say something like,
“It’s carved into a tree somewhere,”
before you realize
you’ve already said it in your sleep.
And when you find the poem she gave you
weeks later,
crumpled in your coat pocket,
you’ll swear you hear her laugh
when you read the last line out loud:
“Don’t follow. I haunt better when I’m alone.”
She’s the reason
someone, somewhere,
is learning the difference
between being worshipped
and being watched.
And when she finally leaves—
because she always does—
you’ll swear you still smell
ozone, orange blossom,
and the beginning of a very pretty ruin.
She leaves you rearranged—
not broken,
just fluent in a dead dialect
that only speaks in warning signs.
You’ll start writing things
you don’t remember feeling
and calling it healing.
But it’s just possession.
The poem wasn’t for you.
It was the door.
She doesn’t burn bridges.
She just convinces them to jump.
She never really leaves.
She just sets the room on fire
and watches who runs toward the smoke.
(And if she ever comes back—
and she will—
don’t blink.
She’s made of edits,
and she notices cuts.)
She gave him a poem instead of her number.
It didn’t end well.
Or maybe it ended exactly how she planned.
