1. Chemistry
The mixture is fragile, volatile at its worst, alchemical magic at its best. Take two parts jealousy, one part paranoia, half measures of exhibitionism and antagonism. If available, add dancing, but never together. Apply heat and pressure with low-back dresses and lingering glances. Leave a trail of open-ended questions about what happens in the space of showing up together and leaving in secret. Expect that you may watch him watch him chest to chest with a woman who's softer than you, kinder than you. Hope that it's true and flirt with men who might be kind to you too. Feel him looking. Escalate. Wait to look back. Escalate. Let one dance with somebody else turn into two, into four, into drinks. Watch as he does the same. Escalate. Make sure nobody loses interest; don't let jealousy sour to bitterness. Imagine what he would do if somebody's hot breath twitched across the crook of your neck. Wonder what you would do if you saw him do the same to somebody else. Escalate.

This is your favorite game.

2. Safety
One night, by way of half-drunk apology, you tell him the ways that one of the people you trust makes you feel terrible about yourself. You suspect this is normal, assume you're a monster, and are prepared to call it what it is. He has a way of pressing at you, of scratching at scabs with incredulous assertions that he just doesn't know why you do what you do, why you are what you are. In return, you rarely have more to offer but a shrug and the same tired refrain about how it's easier to have a friend who makes you think the worst of yourself than to face down the prospect of not having any at all. There's nothing soothing in the way he tells you how stupid that is; he doesn't tell you you deserve better, but he doesn't tell you you don't, either. But he doesn't let you writhe long, and when he helps you change the subject without much grace, it feels like comfort, like forgiveness.

3. Trust
c'mere. i'm still smooth for now. come put your face in my chest. i'll be more comforting and less craggy.

mmm good i want to rest my cheek against your sharp sternum.

lmfao my sharp sternum, above where my heart is, which remains the most romantic fucking thing you've ever said to me.

...i was going to refute that, and then i couldn't remember another time, and i barely remembered saying that. LMFAO why do you put up with me.

you're rich, you're powerful, your dick is better than christmas, and you make me feel pretty. what more could a girl ask for? anything else'd just be greedy. i assume you put up with me for about the same reasons?

nah. i am who i am because of you. you are every reason, every hope, and every dream i've ever had, and no matter what happens to us in the future, everyday we are together is the greatest day of my life. i will always be yours.

.......i. i don't know if you're fucking with me. i don't want to know. come over and put your cheek on my razor sternum so i can pet your hair till you pass out on top of me.

deal.

He's fucking with you. The line that puts your heart in your throat is from a discount movie you used to show him you don't believe in real declarations of love. You haven't figured this out yet, may never catch on. You won't look into it because you don't want to know. Instead, for one night, you play pretend like he's the kind of man who would dredge up a handful of pretty generalities, like you're the kind of woman who needs them, who wants or deserves them. It's better this way.

Hey, d'you remember The Four Seasons? How she told you she'd only ever slept beside one other person, only memorized the heat and contour of one other torso and was afraid she'd make an intruder out of you in the dark? D'you remember how, before, she clawed at your bones: she, thirsty hurricane; you, steady landfall? How she kissed you like it was an emergency until she was too tired to fight you in sleep? D'you remember how it was cute--how she was melodramatic--until suddenly it wasn't? D'you remember how her little body punched and wriggled, made a tempest of the sheets until they wound around your legs like snakes? Like she was trying to make you into somebody else?

D'you remember when she stopped?

D'you remember how, close to sunrise, she twined around you like ivy, skin hot and dry, breath wet and steady against your neck? How still that felt? D'you remember how, when she woke up, she woke up slowly, how she squinted at you for a second like she was sure you weren't real? How she told you she was pretty sure you weren't real?

D'you remember all the things she told you about the way she feels when you go quiet? About how she talked around the ways that muscle memory pushes her to do more, be more, about how scared she is that she won't be enough? D'you remember the first time she believed you when you told her she was enough? The first time she told you that you were too? Did you believe her?

D'you remember how, between the two of you, you swept the ghosts from the corners and the tempest from the bed you've come to share more nights than you don't? How she smiles when you tell her she's fucking perfect and she tells you you're fucking brilliant and neither of you threaten to take it away? D'you remember the surprise in her voice when she tells you she feels safe with you, and how she makes you feel a little wild, a little unsettled, and maybe that's okay?

D'you remember the Four Seasons? How it started there?