I might as well be lost

My heel caught on an uneven section of sidewalk, sending me stumbling forward. A man reached out instinctively to steady me, his family clustered around him like a protective constellation. His young daughter smiled up at me, gap-toothed and genuine, and for a moment I felt something crack inside my chest. They radiated the kind of wholeness I’d been pushing away, a glimpse of connection I both craved and feared.

“Careful there,” he said kindly, his wife nodding in concerned agreement.

“Thank you,” I managed, the words feeling foreign on my tongue.

Ooooo swing and a miss on the whole keeping it together thing

“Girl, come on,” her words echoed in my head as I continued walking. “You can’t keep building walls and then complaining about the view.”