Part of my “healing journey” required me to face how much I had been loved in the dark, how used to that I had become, and how safe I felt being loved where no one could see, touch was the main way to navigate, and silence was expected. I studied how that unnatural quiet settled in my body and those of Black queer folks around my age, how it shaped expectations about how I should pursue love from others. Recovering from that necessitated both a political