The Hallway

I heard her on the phone in the hallway.

Just a fragment. A piece of conversation

that wasn't meant for me. But now I stay

silent, knowing something. The vibration

of it sits in my chest.

I can't unhear it. Can't unknow

what she said. Can't pass the test

of acting normal when she's below

me on the stairs. Can't look

her in the face without the weight

of knowing. It's not my book

to read. But now I translate

every footstep overhead.

Every sound is a message

I'm not supposed to have. Every thread

of noise becomes a passage

into what she is when nobody's

watching. What she admitted

to someone on the phone. The oddities

of her life, now transmitted

to me. And I have to act

like nothing changed. Like I didn't hear.

Like the hallway isn't a contract

between us now. Like I'm clear

of knowing. But I know.

I carry it. In the lobby

tomorrow, I'll smile and slow

down, pretend that nothing's shoddy

about the silence between us.

That's the weight of accidental

knowing. The bus

between me and her. The central

lie. That I don't know what I know.

That she doesn't know I know.

And that I have to let it go

by never showing what I know.