Pre-trivia chatter with Chris,
    then head down,
    serious business—

    last week’s third place stung,
    title needed reclaiming.

The Big Table breathing down my neck,
    huge team,
    every answer tight—
    but I held them off,
    100 to 99.

One point margin.

Somewhere in round three,
          a song dropped—
   one I knew you’d know.

So I texted.
   You knew.

That one point difference
     came from you.

If you’d been there,
   we’d have cleaned house.
   Fifteen more easy.

But trivia wound down,
    the clock pushed past ten,
    and I knew you weren’t coming.

I asked for a call.
      “I’m out rn.”

No details.
   Just out, and heading home.

So I sat at Irby’s,
   tears flavoring my beer,
   Dodgers losing to the Rockies again,

   night collapsing inning by inning.

No goodnight text,
   even after my voice memo.

Sleep broken,
      restless,
      heavy with not-knowing.

Audibles I can handle.
That’s part of the game.

But the silence,
    the vanishing,
    that thin edge of absence—
    that’s the one point margin

    that turns a win into something else entirely.