I Wish I Could Talk To You About Billy Idol

Billy Idol is back.
And I wish I could talk to you.

The first time I heard his voice,
it was with you—
a cassette maybe, or the radio,
or just one of those perfect nights
when time didn’t press so hard against us.
You laughed,
or nodded,
or turned the volume up,
and that was enough to make me like him forever.

It still is.

But now I hear those chords
and they hollow me out.

Because we are severed.
Not frayed. Not faded.
Cut. Clean.
Sharp as betrayal,
dull as the ache that never quite stops humming.

I know why.
I know it was the right thing.
The only thing.
And still—God, still—
I miss what could have been
if you had tried.
If you had chosen something other than harm.
If you had been even the bare minimum
of decent.
Of human.

You weren’t.

And now Billy Idol is back.
And I’m sitting in my car with the windows down,
and the sky is just the right kind of dark,
and for one second
I forget to be angry.
I forget what you did.

I just want to tell you.
That he’s still got it.
That the song still hits.
That I still remember how it felt
to be in your orbit
before it burned.

But I can’t.

And that silence—
that unyielding, echoing silence—
is the part that breaks me most.

Not the loss.
Not even the truth.
Just the unbearable fact
that I still wish
you were someone I could miss
without hurting myself to do it.

Billy Idol is back.
And I’m still here.

And I wish I could talk to you.