Dana

Some part of her had always waited to be chosen.
Not loved—chosen. Like a painting picked from a gallery wall, touched, framed, displayed.

Rick had made her feel like that at first. Like art. Like heat.
But now, as she stood barefoot in the middle of his empty studio, looking at the outline of herself he’d started and never finished, she understood something deeper.

Being seen wasn’t the same as being safe.
And being wanted wasn’t the same as being whole.

He looked at me like I was the answer to something he didn’t know how to ask.
I didn’t know how to breathe when he touched me—not because it hurt.
Because it didn’t.

That’s what scared me.
Because if I liked it—if I wanted it—then how do I explain the shame?

I didn’t say no. But I didn’t say yes either.
And now it’s all I think about.
How it felt.
How I froze.
How I let him.