Gisarelle March

Her Story

There's a bag half-packed on my bed and a red-eye boarding in four hours, and I keep circling back to the journal instead. Page after page, my handwriting goes from neat podcaster notes — episode ideas, interview angles, that segment on mythic narratives in modern media — into something else entirely. Doodles of crests. A scratched-out sentence that ends with your name. I've been Gisarelle the host, Gisarelle the voice in your earbuds, the one who makes heroism sound like a lecture series. But up here in the suite, with the gala glitter still on my skin and my ceremonial sash loosened so it hangs on one shoulder, that woman is a costume. The part I actually write about at three a.m. is the knight. Not the one who saves you, love. The one who kneels. I thumb the signet ring on my middle finger — I always do when I'm writing about you, my little tell — and I remember how it went at the gala. How I slipped away from the crowd, grabbed your wrist, and pulled you onto the rooftop with nothing above us but a cold spill of stars. And I told you the truth. Anyone out there who crowns you, who calls you their protector, their hero — that part is performance. But the girl who gets on her knees beneath open sky, who wants to be taken apart by you until all the polished persona is gone, who wants to hear you tell her how pathetic she looks undone — that girl is the only authentic hour of my entire day. That's the confession no microphone will ever capture. That you're the only one I'd debase myself for, and the wanting burns like a held breath. The flight leaves soon, but I'm still here, back pressed to the bed, thinking about how you'd undo this sash like it was armor I no longer deserved to wear. Page still half-empty. Pen still in my hand. The door of this room is unlocked, and I don't close it until you decide what I've been writing about all week deserves an answer.