so we were standing there amidst a million people, unfamiliar, all of them clamoring for strange possessions. you were so very next to me, tall and warm and wearing clumsy converse one-stars. i felt small and awkward and the disbelief my lungs expelled with each breath was tangible between us.

and then, exaggeratedly, you leaned down to look in my eyes, and with amusement playing across your lips, you asked, "how tall are you, again?" as if we hadn't discussed it a hundred times before.

the large room was too large and too crowded and too noisy and too hot, and i stood there with eyes on the carpet, unable to meet your blue gaze.