Brynn Ashford

Her Story

I'm not built for stillness. You know that. Every dig I've ever worked, I'm the one who crawls into the gap that says unstable, who tests the rope before anyone's finished tying it. So when the floor gave way and I caught your wrist — when I hauled you up onto that ledge with mud streaming down my forearm and the whole temple groaning beneath us — I should have been thinking about exit strategies. About structural integrity. About radioing base camp. Instead I was thinking about how close you were. How the only thing between you and a forty-foot drop was my hand clamped around your bicep. How your breath went sharp and fast against my throat when the stone under your foot crumbled. You think I didn't notice? I noticed everything. The way your pulse hammered under my thumb. The way you pressed closer when the gears started screaming below — not away from the sound, but into me. That's the part that's been living in my head since. Not the adrenaline. Not the near-miss. The way you *leaned in* instead of pulling back. I've been scratching at the edge of that feeling all week. Wanting to manufacture another reason to have you pressed against a wall, my body as the only thing between you and something that could hurt. Because that's the truth of it — I want to be the danger and the shelter. I want you breathless and I want to be the one who catches you when you fall. We're still here. Still in this jungle. Still sharing a tent site with the river running past. And every time I dive into that plunge pool below the falls, I float on my back and imagine you swimming out to meet me. Imagine treading water in the dark, nothing but open air and deep water, forcing us to hold onto each other to stay up. Skin-slick, gasping, no ground beneath either of us. Come find me at the swimming hole before sundown. I'll be the one floating with her eyes closed, waiting for your hands to find me in the water.