call it like I see it, call it like it is, just call

there were truths that I heard that touched me to my core. to the part of me that no one has been able to worm their way into for a long time. and he didn't make it in, he just said things that I could feel inside my chest.
he told me that I hide myself in the shadows so that people won't notice. that part didn't feel as true as everything else. I don't hide. I just don't put myself in the light like I used to.
he told me things I already know. that I'm sensitive and I feel other people. that I care, that I care deeply. as he was talking, as he was reading me, as we drove in his truck to the ocean to sit by the lighthouse and eat vegan brownies, I felt a lightness in my chest that I haven't felt in months. maybe years? I felt that part of me glow and it was strange for someone to see through me so completely. and I still kept my distance. because even with that eerie insight, I still expected him to want something more from me.
I feel cold, and closed, and I try to keep most people distant because I know eventually they will leave me. I wonder at the barriers I have constructed and I wonder how it is that I used to let myself be so vulnerable. I miss clinging onto someone in the night and sobbing against them. I miss opening myself and letting the light pour out. I miss telling the entirety of the truth.
I remember this man, this same man that described me to myself, told me after ex-otter left me that I would soon find someone to love me. but I didn't. what he told me then didn't feel true, just like some of what he said this weekend wasn't true either. but the parts that were left me speechless and close to tears. the truth burns.
it chipped away a layer I've been trying to hide from myself. it chipped away a part of me that had been making it more difficult to feel. little bits of me have withered away over the years, and they can never grow back. the last time I saw her, my therapist told me that in the years I've been with her, the greatest change in me came after ex-otter left me. I died. but people still expected me to be the person that I was. but how could I go back to that? and how can I go back to the friendships I had that left me empty after my mom died? I can't. I am too immersed in my past, even though I try to escape it. I'm getting better, I can feel it, but there's also something beautiful about being broken. there's something magical in trying to reconstruct yourself when you're missing pieces.
the spring is here. I feel as though I could blossom any day now. my thin stalk bends toward the sun. I am less cold. warmth touches me and my skin prickles in goosebumps. and I feel touched inside, too. I am frightened of distance, but feel its meaningless. I am frightened of distance, but know it isn't permanent. I can see through someone, too, you see.
and someday, they'll see through me.