a faint flutter in my stomach, like a butterfly trying to escape, it's that familiar ripple whenever the question comes up, the one about a "real job" again, a question that used to make the muscles in my jaw ache, that would send a phantom vibration through my teeth like a phone ringing for a meeting i didn't want to be in and i think about what "real" even means to her, to the world i left, where real was defined by hours logged and projects delivered and the relentless current of things to DO, and how much of that was just the body remembering the shape of the cage, even after the door dissolved, like i wrote before. but now, that flutter, it dissipates quickly, it doesn't settle into the deep imprint of the blanket on my skin from a night of broken sleep, not anymore. it's just a whisper now, that narrative, easily overridden by the actual quiet hum of the San Francisco summer outside my window, by the way the light falls just right on the cortado i'm letting get cold because i'm not rushing anything, because this IS real, this space, this nothingness i'm learning to cultivate. it’s the quiet strength of unmaking all those tight, precise connections, remembering that a job isn't always something you get paid for in dollars, sometimes it's paid in peace.