a strange sort of valentine

Valentine’s Day is usually a non-event for me since the divorce, just an excuse to wear black lace and buy myself expensive dark chocolate. But today was strangely different. Jon came by to pick up the boys for the weekend, and he lingered at the door. He didn’t rush off like he usually does. We actually stood there and talked about the weather, about the kids, about an old episode of The Craft we both saw on TV last week. He looked at me, really looked at me, in a way he hasn’t since before 2019. It made my stomach do a ridiculous little flip that I absolutely refuse to acknowledge. I am a grown, independent, non-binary person who survived cancer and navigating Manhattan transit; I do not get butterflies over my ex-husband. Yet, here I am, writing about it on the internet. I spent the rest of my evening aggressively tweaking the sidebar of this blog just to distract myself. Whatever this shift in our dynamic is, I am quietly terrified of it, but maybe, just maybe, a tiny bit hopeful.