parlayed into a memory

When I met you, I was crying, because it was cold. An involuntary response, I would have explained if you'd asked. Fortunately I'm a master, and it is possible that you didn't even notice.

We talked for hours. I learned so many things about you. It is my best trick, to lay myself out as on a blanket at a flea market, so obvious in terms of tarnished and broken and hidden treasures. You couldn't help but pull the trinkets from your own pocket in response, a snowglobe holding a childhood memory, a knife you'd used to cut yourself free. By nightfall I'd wrapped my blanket back up again, stuffed everything into a carpet bag, and you were showing me your scars. It is interesting how quickly one can establish intimacy, when it's needed, how fast we can go from perusing the menu to tearing flesh from the bone. 

But eventually it is over. It is always over, one way or the other. These things don't end themselves, and so somebody has to end it. You did the honors, surgical and simple, none of the nonsense of waving a tear-soaked handkerchief as the train pulled away. I am glad it was clean like that, I am. And yet when you left I was crying, because it was cold. An involuntary response, I would have explained if you'd asked.  Fortunately I'm a master, and it is possible that you didn't even notice.