Vince walked over to Eric's desk to check out the new functions he'd just created, and while he waited for Eric to bring up the appropriate data, Vince rested his hands on his shoulders, gentle, easy.

As one of those people who do not need rules of standard behaviour, there was nothing wrong with Vince putting his hands down like that. They are good hands, strong, restful.

I could have wept for someone's hands on my shoulders, protective for no reason. Easy.

People underestimate the need for the touch of another. It feels like I haven't been touched, truly touched, in ages. I was so thirsty for something that I didn't even know that I needed, but an easy need to fufill. All it took was a simple hand on my shoulder, a hand on my wrist, a plea to stop my tears. Reassurance that I am real, that I have a physical presence, becoming aware of a need at the same time that it's fufilled.

---

And how was I to know, much later, that you felt it too, that you felt more with that touch than I did. That night, you took my hand and confessed an attraction to me, I stared dumbly, not sure what I should say. And two nights later we had our first kiss at five in the morning.

And months, almost a year later, it's still about you. We sit in the movies together, my left hand crosses my body and grips the edge of the cupholder between our seats and your right hand is doing the same. There are mere millimeters between our skin, but it feels like miles, and I ache for you. Your hand brushes against mine, and I nearly pass out from the contact.

Just friends.

Thoughts.
Hours.
Days.
Months.
Years now I've spent on this thing. Bits of data. Lines of code upon lines of code. The time slips away very quickly. Yet I don't seem to have much to show. Maybe that's why I'm obsessed with productivity.

I'm here... In this cold computer world I've helped to build. I spend days looking at the artificial... that which is made by hands before mine, the godfathers of code, as I shall be one day. I look at nothing but this mound of human thought brought into being, and with something so totally human, it is at the same time so cold, and uninviting. The sharpened perfection of it all. The standards held high to make our tools more precise and more intelligent. It's an edge we balance on.

I miss her. She's hours away now. We used to share the same bed, the same thoughts, the same embrace at night. We are still together in spirit, but I'm wrenched apart from her once more. She made this world have a heart; she gave it a soul. She gives me a reason to explore this cold cave of intellect every day.

To spend these fleeting minutes knowing that there is humanity somewhere in my life. To know that the same human hug from her smiling person can make all the cares fall apart. The same simple act that has warmed mankind for centuries still has it's wonder. To remember what it was like to sleep soundly feeling her nestled safely in my arms. The quiet rise and fall of her breast; the gentle beating of a soothed heart. Knowing that I was her contentment was contenting in itself. To know that it is gone for now, and a part of my humanity on hiatus, until I can get that back.

People just aren't the same. I see what it does to people in my profession. Those who don't find someone are warped, changed... It's hard to describe. I see them driven by a cold, cruel sense of purpose. Their machine becomes their contact... their soruce of warmth, and they never quite find their soul apart from the cycles they spin.

I don't want to become that person. Not again. Never again. I drive my life, my day, and my ambition around that. To be able to tackle the world seems more managable, more appealing, more full, if I could feel that comfort surround me, even for half an hour. It gives my life more meaning...

just to have some human contact.