I ran all the way home. I didn’t even stop to take the bus. I just kept going. Something inside of me just kept making my feet pound the pavement until they became raw and blistered.

I burst through my front door and quickly locked it behind me. The house was dark even though the windows were open. I stepped through the rooms as if I had never seen them before in my life.

What happened back there? I couldn’t begin to explain. But something happened when I watched that stranger sitting there, lighting cigarettes to watch them burn. The look on his face when I ran haunted me the most.

It was if the whole world had betrayed him. I felt horrible for running away so rudely. But it was if those very matches had ignited some fear deep inside of me. And then I thought back to his haunting expression, and I recognized it from my own reflection in a mirror.

That’s what it looks like to be alone.