Both Truths & The Fall

The silence after my confession stretched until it hurt.

Riley still hadn’t moved. She stood in front of me with her hands loosely at her sides, lips still slightly swollen from the kiss, eyes searching my face like she was trying to decide whether the words I had just thrown between us were real or some drunken accident she could still undo. My own breathing hadn’t settled. The wall at my back was the only thing keeping me upright. Every second she didn’t speak made the confession feel heavier, more irreversible, more like a mistake I couldn’t take back.

Then Riley said, very quietly, “I...