Flawless Façades

I’ve been thinking about layers.

How many do we cover ourselves with, in order to protect ourselves from the unknown?

I lost count on how many protect me, and I am sure you have too.

It is a pity though.

I ask for a moment/a glimpse of peace and quiet, so we could strip ourselves, showing who we truly are: naked, vulnerable, with our scars, bruises, lies, all out in the open.

Don’t you see?

We are so alike it scares me.

But then, we are different.

I remember the first time I saw you.

A picture and I knew.

The way you posed, the way your hair looked, your eyes. All of it spoke to me in a way, words can’t express.

For months, I pined for you silently.

You were mine and no one else’s, even if it was only in my mind.

I protected the vision of you because it was pure, it was untouched, it was safe.

But then, the moment/the moment we shared: me wearing red on my clothes and lips, you with your 70s jeans and cropped top. The moment we looked at each other froze. For what felt like minutes, we just stood there. Not saying a word.

And everything changed after that.

It became real, or the possibility of something happening did.

But this also meant we started dressing up.

Layer after layer, shield after shield.

To prove to each other, who was the strongest one, who wouldn’t get hurt.

Months have passed, and we still play this game.

I always wished I would fall in love, but little did I know the complexity of it.

I wish one day we will have an instant.

You and I/in a space where judgment doesn’t come in, where words are carefully spoken and where we can rest our disguises and show ourselves as what we are.

But I am starting to believe that this day will never come.

So, I ask myself, how much is wasted? Empty covers, photoshopped pictures, flawless façades.

No time to waste.

So let’s pretend; pretend to have it all.