I never thought New York could feel like this soft at the edges, warm in its shadows, a city that suddenly remembers how to breathe just because you’re walking beside me. I came here only to see you, to repay the quiet debts of all the moments you waited, you called, you cared, while I kept my distance like it meant nothing. But then came your laughter, spilling into the streets like a language I’d forgotten I knew. Your touch, accidental, intentional, impossible to ignore wrote its name on the back of my hand. And as you pulled me through the winding lanes, as if the whole city belonged to us, I felt something give way inside me, something tender, terrifying, undeniably alive. You showed me things I never wanted to see not because they were beautiful, but because you were the one showing them. And somehow that was enough to make even the ordinary glow. So here I am, falling in ways I’ve never fallen, into a city I never loved, into a person I never expected into you. To be continued…