I don’t want to be touched.

Not even when I’m alone on the dance floor of a poorly-lit night club in a black dress and my favorite blazer

As you slither your way behind me, grabbing my waist with your free hand and clutching a warm beer in the other

Your humidified breath dripping down my neck as you try to sync two sets of hips to a beat I could feel just fine on my own

I don’t want to be touched.

Not when you ask me to go on a drive with you through the canyon, and the music is loud enough to rumble my ear drums

And you’re driving reckless and fast, my entire body swaying with the slightest twist of the steering wheel

My safety entirely in your hand, just like my upper leg, as you clench it tighter with every curve in the road

I don’t want to be touched.

Not when I’m strutting through the corridor of the mall downtown in an outfit that makes me feel strong and beautiful and sophisticated, and you, a stranger, catch my absentminded gaze

Your strides quicken as you rapidly collide into my path of travel and grab both sides of my face with your skinny, foreign hands

My eyes widen like the moon as you plant your dry, thin lips on my mouth, pull me over to a nearby bench, and sit me on to your lap, all before you even bother to tell me your name

The passers-by fight the urge to clap at your romantic gesture

I don’t want to be touched.

Not when you ask me to the movies, and you choose the lounge chairs in the very back of the theater where we can be alone

You allow me to enjoy the trailers without disturbance, and once the lights reach their dimmest point, your hands slide under my shirt

And I try to keep my eyes on the screen, but the weight and pinch of your grip makes me flinch and I tell you I need to go to the bathroom, but really I’m suffocating, and the stiff air within the bathroom stall only makes it worse

I don’t want to be touched.

Not even after sipping a drink of your creation in your living room as we watch some stupid action film on your modern, stiff couch

And before the final credits roll, I realize that I’ve been rendered immobile, and my body is slung over your shoulder, and we disappear in to your bedroom

And your body and your bed sheets consume me until the early morning hours, my body releasing inaudible screams

I don’t want to be touched.

Because you never bothered to ask me if this is okay, or are you comfortable, or where is the line

And if you did ask, you didn’t bother to comply

Because my consciousness resides within my skull, but I can’t afford the mortgage on the body that keeps it off the ground

But apparently, you can, and you take and you do what satisfies you

I don’t want to be touched.

Not even by the best-intentioned one of you out there

Because the price of security is isolation, and the perpetual fear of failing to protect myself shackles me

And my inability to form healthy relationships is inhibited, my detachment from the human touch keeps me numb for now

So that if you want to touch me, I can hide within compartmentalized lobes within my brain, temporarily severing the nerves of my periphery until it’s safe to come out again

I don’t want to be touched.

Even when you shower me in compliments about my beauty, intellect or comedic nature

Or buy me flowers, a drink, or a hamburger

So I buy those for myself

And I go to movies and canyon drives and night clubs by myself

And I feel myself

Because I don’t want to be touched.