Chapter 2 | Entry Seventeen

"Maybe the work isn't learning to let go of the dream. Maybe it's learning how to hold it without floating away."

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I woke up this morning with my body still humming.

Still carrying the ghost of what I let myself imagine last night, his hands on my skin, his mouth on my lips, the warmth of his breath, the weight of his body over mine, the way it would feel to be loved by him that completely.

I let myself go there. All the way there.

And now I'm tender. Exposed. Like I peeled back a layer I usually keep hidden and can't quite figure out how to put it back.

I moved through my day slower than usual. More intentional.

Made my coffee and stood at the counter longer than I needed to, feeling the warmth of the mug in my hands as I let the world around me drift out of focus.

I drove to the beach with the windows down, letting the air move over my skin.

But underneath it all, I could still feel it, the heat of wanting something my body has never actually known. The vulnerability of letting myself imagine being taken that fully, that tenderly, that completely.

It's one thing to think about desire.

It's another thing entirely to let yourself feel it in your body. To let it move through you without shutting it down or redirecting it or pretending it's smaller than it is.

And now I'm carrying it. This beautiful, impossible longing that has nowhere to go. My heart is overflowing. Not broken, but full, so full it feels like it's spilling over the edges, like my ribs can't contain how much love is moving through me right now.

It's not anger. Not fully sadness. Not loss or grief.

It's love without an ending. Love without a container to hold it. Love that my body wants to give, wants to pour into someone, but there's no one here to receive it.

I'm glowing from within. I can feel it, this warmth, this aliveness, this tenderness radiating out from my chest.

But who will see it?

Who will know that I'm here, full of this love, ready to give it, aching to share it?

My breath is deep and slow. I notice it now, the way I'm breathing from the top of my lungs and down into my belly, like my body is waiting for something. Like it's still anticipating him to touch me.

The morning light coming through my windshield feels hot. Sharp. It's hitting my skin and I'm hyper-aware of every inch of it, the steering wheel under my palms is hard, the seat beneath me supportive, the way the air is chilly, raising goosebumps on my arms. Everything feels amplified. Everything feels like a reminder that I'm here in this body, that this desire is mine to carry.

This is what desire feels like when it has nowhere to go. When it opens a door in you and there's nothing on the other side. When your body remembers something it's never actually had and won't let you forget it.

I can't undo this. Can't go back to not knowing what it would feel like to be wanted like that, to be held like that, to let someone see all of me and not flinch.

My body won't let me pretend it didn't happen.

So I came here. To the beach with my journal and pen in hand.

Not to escape my vulnerability, but to be with it. To feel the ocean breeze move along my skin, The warmth of the sand beneath me, the sound of the waves rolling in and out. To let myself integrate what I just let myself feel, and to find my way back to solid ground without pretending it didn't happen.

And I'm trying to figure out who I am without the fantasy.

Without imagining what it would feel like if he loved me back the way I love him. Without replaying the moments when I felt seen, wanted, met. Without the small hope that maybe, someday, he'll realize what we could have been.

I know I can't settle. I know I won't. I've tried, and my body won't let me.

But I also can't keep living like this, half here, half somewhere else. Half present, half waiting for something that may never come.

So what does it look like to keep the dream alive for myself, not for him, not as something I'm waiting for him to fulfill, but as a compass for what I actually need?

What if the fantasy isn't the problem? What if it's a teacher?

What if it's showing me: This is what being fully received feels like. This is what devotion looks like. This is what I will not compromise on.

I try to write a paragraph in my journal, then another, and nothing is making any sense. I don't know how to do this yet.

I don't know how to hold this much love without it pulling me under or pushing me toward people who can't meet it.

But maybe the work isn't about stopping the dream.

Maybe it's about learning to stand on solid ground while I dream.

To feel the waves roll in and let them pass. To let my heart feel everything without needing to fix it or numb it or fill it with someone who isn't right.

The ocean doesn't ask me to figure it out. It just keeps moving.

And maybe I can too.

—Still holding the dream, still learning how to stand