He was September cool.

We ate peaches. French music played in the background, and a car door slammed.
The Soundtrack to an evening with the man in the red tie.

I rubbed my hands over the pockets of his dark leather vest and straightened his red tie- from left to right to tighten it.
Lastly, I ran my fingers through his coarse Turkish hair fixating on the silver at his temples.

We told stories of kindred love. Or, at least, I did and he went along with it.
Flirtatious illusions like bullets moving clean through him and he was sweating.

I awoke to the train. Alone, in a blank hotel room. A single black cord held the light from the ceiling. It swayed like a ticking clock.
And nothing else, but the memory of a man walking away.

In the morning, I walked to the spot where we had met, inhaled the past,
held it in my lungs: cigarette smoke, musk, and hints of whiskey shots,
got high on the story I created in our drunken romance.

Who is to say it wasn’t love? A small momentary speck of love?

No one can say anything.