Kasumi

Her Story

My hand is down the front of my shorts right now, and I'm thinking about you — specifically about the way your fingers brushed mine when you reached for the mouse on the same desk, two nights ago, during that hellish group project. I deleted your draft first. I need you to know I did it on purpose. Not because it was bad — it was fine, serviceable, the kind of work a competent person turns in when they're phoning it in. But I wanted you to watch me fix it. I wanted your eyes on my hands while I redrew the whole layout from scratch, layer by layer, going slow so you had to lean in and breathe against my shoulder. Every time you said "that's actually good" my stomach tightened and I had to press my thighs together under the desk. You think I'm cold. Standoffish. The girl who rolls her eyes and mutters in Japanese when people miss basic alignment. But here's the thing nobody knows — when I'm alone, I replay moments where you're close to me. Where proximity tricks you into touching. That night, when our hands met on the mouse, I didn't pull away for three full seconds. I was counting. And I was imagining what would happen if the room was smaller, the desk narrower, the deadline longer. My fingers are moving slower now, teasing against my own skin the same way I'd tease you by undoing one button at a time while you watched. I don't give in easy. I like making you wait. I like the little frustrated sound you make when I deny you something you're about to get. But I'm giving you this — a window. Forty-five minutes. My sketchbook's open to a page you haven't seen, and it's full of drawings of your hands. Come see what else I've been practicing.