She will hate that I am finally writing about her.

But I think she will understand.

That our words are not yet gratitude.

That I have Educated Guess on repeat

Because there are songs for each of us there.

Songs of how I feel and how she might feel and how we both

Feel.

And how I am eating less

and drinking more

Like before.

How I am craving a cigarette

because deep in my grief cells

there is smoke

and Ani Difranco

and this familiar flavor.

Reminiscent,

yet piercingly foreign.

Our loss to each other a fingerprint tattoo.

A “particular loneliness”, I wrote.

A “particular loneliness.” she wrote back to me.

We resonate now,

as I listen for her tone on my phone.

Even when it doesn’t come,

I place my thumb where there was once a button,

as recent as nine years ago.