Beyond Chemistry: The Unspoken Literacy of Desire

Before loving, I studied people – not credentials, but their rhythm, contradictions, and unguarded gestures. I sought fluency, not compatibility. Attraction, I learned, isn’t preference but literacy: reading unspoken truths in glances and sighs. We call it “chemistry,” yet it’s deeper knowledge. A “type” isn’t just physical traits, but the body’s irrational insistence – this one – triggered by someone’s presence altering the atmosphere. Dating apps reduce this complex sense-making to sterile UX design.

Reductionist evolutionary psychology frames attraction as optimal mate selection: symmetry, wealth, pheromones. Yet true desire ignores Darwin. It speaks dialect: drawn to safety’s scent, ghostly echoes, or those challenging decades of moral scaffolding.

What we ache for holds intelligence beyond words – stuttering in French, murmuring in music, or irritating us into honesty. Like terrifying Sirens knowing your name, real attraction disrupts. It’s gravity pulling toward missing pieces, potentially completing or unmaking us.