I had been waiting on this text for days.

Is there somewhere you can meet me, where no one will see?

I text back without hesitation.

Our usual. Room 93. One hour.

I loved the attention he gave me. I didn't care that he had a girlfriend. In fact, it almost made it better. The fact that he had someone else, and still wanted me, made me feel powerful. Wanted. Chosen.

We both needed the escape.

It didn't happen as often anymore. But when it did, I jumped. No questions asked.

I kept a bag packed, always. A clean shirt, cheap vodka, pills, condoms—everything we needed to forget the world for a while.

You might wonder why a 17-year-old girl would need to forget. Why she'd find comfort in a hotel room with someone a few years older. But sometimes, it wasn't about what was wrong—it was the terrifying fact that I couldn't name what was wrong. That nameless weight, that quiet ache, made me need him more than ever.

I wait in Room 93. Minutes stretch into hours.

The longer I wait, the more I spiral. My hands shake. I want to scream, throw something, run. But when he finally walks through the door, all the anger dissolves like sugar in hot water.

He's here. That's all that matters.

"Sorry, baby girl," he says softly. He sees the tension in my face. He always does.

I don't ask where he was. His answers are always lies, and I stopped wanting the truth a long time ago.

I was his number two. And that meant waiting. Wanting. Settling for crumbs and pretending they were enough.

He touches my cheek and my heart stumbles. He's the only one who ever made me feel this vulnerable. Every wall I ever built, he tore down with a look. I fell in love with him slowly, and then all at once, and now I don't know how to unlove him.

"You're here now," I say. "That's all that matters. Let's have some fun."

I turn on the music, loud enough to drown out the world. I pour us both a drink—mine vanishes in seconds. He sips his.

"Slow down," he says. "Always so quick to get started."

I smile with my eyes, already swaying to the beat. He watches from the bed, eyes full of hunger. He always liked it when I made him wait. When I reminded him I wasn't just something to use—I was something to chase.

Here in Room 93, I'm not his second choice. I'm the choice.

When I finally let him touch me, it's like exhaling after holding my breath all day.

"You know how perfect you are?" he asks.

He says it every time. Not because it's true, but because he loves the way I react—like I've never heard the words before. Like I need them to live.

I kiss him hard. Push him back onto the bed. This is the moment I fall for him again, and again, and again.

His touch drowns out the emptiness. His voice replaces the silence in my mind. For five, ten, fifteen minutes—I'm his. I'm seen. I'm enough.

The Observer

A wave of sadness hits me as I watch you walk down the street again.

You've got that blue backpack—the one that makes you glow. Whenever you carry it, you look lighter. Freer. Like a kid on the first day of summer.

I always wonder what's inside. What could possibly make you smile like that?

Other times, I see you without it, and your face is unreadable. Eyes empty. Like you're walking through a world you don't want to be in.

I wish I could be what's inside that bag. I wish I could be the thing that makes you smile. But I don't even exist to you. You've passed me so many times and never looked twice.

You're all I see. And I'm invisible to you.