But gifts are not supposed to ache.
I wanted to give it once. Not for love, not for God, not for marriage. Just for me —to stop the counting. To stop the way I flinch when friends laugh about their first times, their bad ones, their funny ones, their strange ones. I have no story. Only a hallway. Only a door I keep polishing instead of opening.
Mine is a room I’ve lived in too long—walls I’ve memorized, a bed still made with hospital corners, dust gathering on the threshold no one crosses. They tell me to be proud. That patience is a kind of power. But power doesn't tremble in the dark wondering if it's still power when no one asks to hold it.
Missax — that ache you left unnamed. That scar shaped like a question mark. You taught me that virginity isn't innocence. It's just unlived life crystallized into a single fragile fact. And facts, when held too long, turn to stone.