I suppose this is a relatively minor issue in the grand scheme of things, but I find myself increasingly incapable of sustaining a conversation that requires any level of emotional transparency. This is stupid but I feel like I’m watching a movie of my own life from the back row of a theater. I live in a zip code where the hedges are trimmed to exactly thirty-six inches and the silence at night is ALMOST aggressive. Mark—my partner of three years—was sitting on the edge of the bed tonight, trying to initiate what he calls a "real talk" about our future. He looked earnest, which is a facial expression I find difficult to categorize without feeling a sense of impending irritation. He started talking about the "next steps" for us, which I assume is suburban shorthand for a thirty-year mortgage and perhaps a golden retriever to fill the empty rooms of a colonial-style house. Instead of engaging with the actual content of his query, I told him he looked like he was auditioning for a low-budget pharmaceutical commercial about chronic back pain. It was a reflex. A physiological response to the threat of intimacy. He stopped talking, and the silence that followed had a specific density to it... like the air before a thunderstorm. I just went back to my laptop to adjust the kerning on a logo for a boutique pet food brand. I’ve analyzed my behavior and it appears to be a consistent pattern of emotional displacement. Whenever he attempts to bridge the distance, I deploy sarcasm as a primary defense mechanism. It’s effective. It creates an immediate barrier that he can't quite penetrate without appearing humorless. I see the disappointment on his face as a set of data points—dilated pupils, downward tilt of the mouth—rather than an actual feeling I am responsible for. The clinical term for this is likely 'avoidant attachment,' though I prefer to think of it as a form of high-level quality control. I can spend ten hours obsessing over the HEX code for a specific shade of "trustworthy" blue for a client, but I cannot seem to allocate any cognitive resources to the person sleeping five inches away from me. People in this neighborhood expect a certain level of performance. You get the career, you get the partner, you get the suburban sprawl, and you pretend the internal architecture of your life isn't completely hollowed out. I watch myself from the ceiling. I see this woman in her thirties making a joke about "commitment issues" while her partner is clearly reaching out for some kind of anchor. I am the one who cuts the anchor line every SINGLE time. I don't know why I do it. I don't feel "hurt" or "scared"—words people use to justify being difficult. I just feel a profound sense of boredom when things get too heavy. It’s like my brain hit a maximum capacity for sincerity years ago and now it just auto-rejects any new files. It’s 2:14 AM now. The blue light from my phone is the only thing illuminating the room. Mark is asleep, or at least he’s breathing with the rhythmic cadence of someone who has given up on the evening.