This is where we meet by Sorcha Sheehy Williams (Lucent Dreaming Issue 8)

I was prepared to feel alone, expected the government-mandated 2-metre gap to yawn between us, cold and hostile. I expected these new spaces to be voids, to confirm our separateness. Instead, these distances have borne a new kind of touch, now that touch (skin on skin) is not permitted.
As I walk past you, one of us stepping onto the road, the other pressed into a hedge, the air between us crackles with electricity; both of us are hyper-aware of our growing closeness, of the significance of our closeness, of being too close. The space between us is anything but empty: it is rich, pregnant with intention. It is a dense, soft, illuminated thing, something we both can feel as we move further, closer, too close. The heat of it rises and fades as we pass.
The 2-metre gap has become, not the absence of touch, but a new way of touching; we discover that both boundary and connection can be
established, not just skin-to-skin, but mind-to-mind.

In this way, we still meet.

Sorcha is a 26 year old Irish woman, whose love of language brought her to Cardiff in 2018 to do an MA in Applied Linguistics. Prior to that she studied Philosophy and Linguistics at University College Dublin and spent some years teaching English as a Foreign Language. She enjoys writing most when others are involved, and so participates in writing groups and open mic nights when she can. She currently lives in Roscommon, Ireland.

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Lucent Dreaming is an independent creative writing magazine publishing beautiful, imaginative and surreal short stories, poetry and artwork from emerging authors and artists worldwide. Our aim is to encourage creativity and to help writers reach publication! Subscribe to Lucent Dreaming now, support us on Patreon and follow us on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.