The Night We Forgot Our Names

He didn’t want to know my name.
Not right away.
And I didn’t ask for his.

We met at the edge of the city—where neon bleeds into the lake,
and the air hums with the music of unanswered questions.

He said:

“Let’s be nobody for a while. Just two souls that met too late, or maybe too soon.”

We didn’t sit in a hotel lounge or sip expensive wine.
We sat in the back of his vintage car,
parked on a hill that overlooked Toronto’s skyline
like a city made of glass waiting to crack.

He played records. Real ones.
Dusty jazz and velvet voices.
And as the saxophone wept between us, I remembered who I almost used to be.

I asked what he did for work.
He said:

“I sell silence to noisy people.”
And laughed, like it hurt.

I told him I was an escort.
He didn’t flinch.
Just said:

“That must be a lonely kind of honesty.”

We didn’t kiss.
We just breathed together.

The clock on the dashboard blinked past midnight.
He whispered:

“Promise me something, Talia—don’t let anyone make you forget how rare you are.”

Funny how a stranger can remind you of your worth
better than a lover ever could.

When I left, he handed me a folded note:

“If I’d met you another way, maybe I’d never have left.”
“But I’m glad we were no one tonight.”

I never saw him again.
But sometimes I drive to that same hill
and listen to the wind for his name.

What Escorting Sometimes Is

For Talia Rivers, escorting isn’t always about touch or desire.
Sometimes, it’s about presence.
About holding space for people who carry too much to say aloud.

That night wasn’t passion.
It was poetry.