Misha, Part 6 - Do you remember your first kiss?

Do you remember your first kiss?

Not the person or the moment, not the story you tell about it now. I mean the kiss itself. The feeling of it. The temperature of the air. The weight in your chest before it happened and what changed after.

Most people don’t.

We remember who, maybe where. But not how it felt. Because we didn’t have the words. No framework. It came before we could hold it properly. So it passed through us. Our bodies kept it. Our minds let it go.

One of the most important moments of your young life, and it’s half gone.

Not because it wasn’t real.

Because it was too real.

After that kiss I told you about, Sima and I saw each other every day. We were still kids, but the current had started pulling. We weren’t just sweethearts anymore. Something had changed. We were a we.

We left for university together. Same city, different paths. We were careful but close. We shared food. Shared books. Shared silence.

It felt like we had time.

We didn’t.

The war reached us before it officially did. Mobilization notices started circulating. Then the rumors. Border closures. Detentions. I knew I was going to be drafted.

We had one conversation about it. It wasn’t emotional. It was quiet, focused. We looked at train routes. We ran the numbers. We ruled things out.

Overland was too slow. Too exposed. Checkpoints everywhere. Every road had lists, and lists had names.

We put our money together and bought me a plane ticket. One-way. To Tbilisi. Georgia.

I made it. Just barely. The airport was full of men like me. Some older, most younger. No one spoke. We looked like soldiers already. We just weren’t wearing the uniforms yet.

Sima had followed. She took the train.

Later, I heard she made it to the border.

Then she was detained.

They questioned her. Held her. Demanded names. She gave them nothing.

I didn’t hear this from her. I heard it from others who were there, who saw her, who told me what happened long after it was over.

She never told them my name.

I’ll tell you what I remember about that kiss.

Not the shape of it. Not the angle.

I remember the moment before, when her breath caught and the air felt thinner. I remember thinking she might back away.

She didn’t.

That’s what a kiss feels like.

It feels like someone choosing not to run.