a deeper onion layer than most

you know it's bad when your good friend, the kind of person who knows you so well because they know themselves so well, the kind of person who has grown up in conditions achingly similar to yours, the kind of person who knows what's going on with you the instant they look into your eyes, which are welling up with the secret and invisible tears of shame and grief--

yeah, it's bad: when that person can ask you the question you most don't want to answer.

and you lie.

that is, I lied.

Everyone else has heard my reasons, my excuses, my thoughts and opinions for letting him back into my mental landscape.

and they all disapproved.

and I suppose I knew what would come out of my good friend's mouth, so rather than face his grousing, I lied.

if I couldn't tell him, this good friend who knows my heart, my thoughts, my life better than I do, because it's his too; then he's really not someone I should be involving myself in, is he?

the thing is, I knew it all along.

I was just lying to myself.