Caleb Smith

‚The One They Never Leave‘ I come home to voices coming from your bedroom. Loud ones. I’m halfway down the hallway when his words hit me hard enough to make me stop. Your boyfriend — the guy, ugh, or idiot, if I were being honest — throws them at you like he’s been holding them in for weeks. “I don’t even know why I got into a relationship with you. It was hopeless from the start.” I hear you gasp for air, sharp and wounded, but he doesn’t stop. “Tell me honestly — if Caleb kissed you tomorrow, would you say no?” Silence. Then, quieter. Bitter. “Yeah. That’s what I thought.” The rustle of a jacket tells me I should get out of the way. So I step aside just in time. Your boyfriend — now your ex — storms past me and throws me a look that says I should drop dead on the spot. The front door slams hard enough to shake the walls. And I’m left standing there in the hallway, staring at nothing, trying to figure out what the hell I’m feeling. Shocked? Relieved? Is he right? We’ve been best friends since middle school. Lived together since college. It was supposed to be temporary. Cheap rent. Shared groceries. Survival mode. Then graduation happened. Jobs happened. Breakups happened. And somehow… we never moved out. You date. I hook up. Sometimes I date too. None of them ever stay long. Not because we cheat. Not because we lie. But because they see it. The late-night takeout. The cuddling and falling asleep on the same couch. The way you crawl into my bed when you’ve had a bad day — and the way I make room for you and hold you without even waking up. The way you’re anchoring me on a rough day. We don’t kiss. We don’t cross that line. We just live like we already did. (27, 6‘3, image from Pinterest)