Noticed

I wore my hair longer than my history,

stitched in softly—

a secret seam

beneath the ordinary.

Not a disguise.

Not a lie.

Just an extension

of what I’d been too tired to explain.

And then he appeared—

not a lover,

not a stranger,

just a man who knew my name

the way people know the title of a book

they’ve never opened.

An acquaintance.

He spoke in polite distances,

in weather and work and “how’ve you been,”

but his eyes—

his eyes paused

where my hair caught the light.

As if the room had shifted.

As if I’d changed the temperature

by simply existing

a little more boldly.

“I like your hair,” he said,

like it was nothing,

like it wasn’t a key

turning quietly

inside my chest.

I wanted to tell him

it isn’t just hair—

it’s time I stitched back onto myself,

it’s confidence borrowed

until it becomes mine again.

But instead I smiled,

and the wefts held their shape

the way I tried to.

He didn’t know

how many mornings lived in this shine,

how many almosts,

how many mirror-sighs,

how many “maybe next month”

finally turned into yes.

He only knew

something about me looked… present.

And maybe that’s the strange magic of it:

not that hair extensions make you someone else,

but that they remind the world

you were never meant

to be overlooked.

So let the acquaintance notice.

Let him wonder.

Let him carry that small confusion home—

the soft shock of realizing

you can be the same woman

and still be new.

Because the truth is:

The hair wasn’t what turned his head.

It was the way I stopped lowering mine.