Chapter 1 | Entry Five

"Desire doesn't ask permission. It rises like heat from the earth, like the body remembering it was made to feel everything, the ache, the hunger, the wanting that has no name and no destination, only the truth that you are alive."

There's a warmth low in my belly tonight, Moon.

I wasn't expecting it.

I was just lying here, feeling the weight of my own body in these sheets, and then, there it was. A stirring. A pulse. Something waking up that I thought might have gone to sleep forever.

My body remembers.

It remembers what it feels like to want. To ache. To feel that delicious, terrifying aliveness that starts somewhere deep and spreads like honey through every bit of me.

And I don't know what to do with it.

Because last time I felt this, it led to everything, an opening, a connection, and then shattering. Last time I let myself feel this much, I lost it all. Or maybe, I lost the version of myself that could make herself smaller, quieter, less.

So what does it mean that my body wants this again?

There's no one here. No arms to fall into. No eyes meeting mine across a crowded room. Just me and these sheets and this warmth that won't go away.

And part of me is afraid.

Afraid that this intensity is too much. That no one will ever match it. That I'll spend the rest of my life burning alone, wanting things I can't name, aching for a touch that meets me at this depth.

Afraid that if I let myself feel this full, I'll be abandoned again. Reminded again that this aliveness, this wild, hungry, feminine thing in me, is too much for the world to hold.

The desire itself feels like proof.

Proof that I'm still here. Still real. Still a woman.

My body doesn't care that he's gone. It doesn't care that I'm alone. It just wants to feel. To be touched. To experience the fullness of passion in this skin.

And maybe that's the gift I wasn't ready to see yet.

That this wanting is mine.

Not his. Not about him. Not dependent on anyone else showing up to meet me.

Just mine.

My body, remembering that it was made for pleasure. For sensation. For the exquisite vulnerability of desire that asks for nothing and everything at once.

I'm afraid of it, this wanting.

But I'm also... aware of it.

The warmth is still there, low in my belly. My skin feels electric. I can feel my own heartbeat between my legs, this pulse that says you're alive.

And maybe I don't need to know what to do with it yet.

Maybe I just need to let myself feel it.

To let my body want without shame. Without making it smaller. Without apologizing for the intensity of this aliveness.

Because this heat, this hunger, this feminine fire…this is mine.

—Still burning