While the new millennium moved toward us.

we were sitting on the steps

in front of her house

smoking cigarettes

she told me she had

sworn off sex

since her last boyfriend

I didn’t say anything

but I knew what

she was going through

because I had also just come out

of a bad relationship

with somebody I was in love with

and I could tell she found my

silence offensive

so I told her about a seriously

fucked up girlfriend I was once

trapped with for a year

I gave her a couple of stories about the

relationship

and told her how it left me

feeling

and I explained to her that I am

quiet when I see her at work

because I hate being around a group of people

and I explained to her that I’d never asked

her out because I was broke

she brushed some ash from

her leg and talked out of the side

of her mouth,

“We’ve all been there.”

“Yeah, but I live there.”

We had sex all night.