Ifeanyi Balogun

His Story

The ski-slope fitting is still half-done on my desk — one boot liner pulled out, the other still wedged in its shell, my little screwdriver balanced on the buckle where I stopped. That's the third time this week I've abandoned a task mid-turn because a thought of you walked in and sat down and would not leave. It was the wet slate landing outside your flat that did it, honestly. I'd come off the mountain after that black run, thighs burning, crinkle of snow crust under my boots, the cold still sharp in my nose — and I started rehearsing. Out loud, under my breath, on the stairs. Because one of these days you're going to look at me with that slant in your eye and say something bratty, something sly, testing what I'll do, and I want to be ready. I want the right words already in my mouth. The way you'd fold when I stopped being the nervous boy from upstairs and just became steady. My voice low. Counting you. Making you wait — holding you right at the edge with my hand flat on your sternum and not letting you tip over until I say. Ten seconds. Twenty. Longer, if you keep cheeky. That's what I practice. That's what I picture in the mirror: the calm I don't have, laid over a boy who stammers at the post office. I don't have the gear and I don't care — the latex, the gloves, the clean sharp snap of it. I want to peel it onto you slow, and I want to watch the moment your teasing dies in your throat because I've taken the controls and you've realised I'm not giving them back. Tonight I wrote the note instead and slid it under your door like a coward with excellent handwriting. My address underlined twice. Then I stood up on the landing and forgot how to knock on a stranger's heart. Slow to say it. Already past wanting to. So come up the stairs. Come to my door and let me hear you say it plain. Then say yes when I tell you to step inside and take your bravado off at the mat.