Maybe One Day

4

The first time we kissed it was raining. Not like those films that lie where couples kiss in the rain and be happy and together forever. It was back at her flat, which was dismal and always smelt of smoke. We couldn't watch the stars because the clouds covered them and the rain was too heavy, so she took me to her house and we smoked in there instead, and spoke like we did in the night times. She told me about this one time when she was young, she had enough of this world and slit her wrists in the bath. She would have died too, her parents certainly didn't care enough, but her dads mistress needed to do her makeup and she forced the bathroom door open thinking it was empty and found her. She told me that if her parents had found her then maybe it would have been different. They didn't even send her to hospital, her mother couldn't bear the humiliation. They just put a bandage on her and then sent her to her room. To this very day they still don't know what they've done.

After she had told me this she showed me the scars on her wrists and then cried, holding me like she was scared I was going to leave. This was nearly the most vulnerable I ever saw her, and I told her I wasn't going anywhere. I kissed all her tears away and then kissed her mouth gently, she then kissed me back harder. I didn't let it escalate, but she did fall asleep in my arms on the sofa, breathing deeply.

I always took her breathing for granted, her in and out motion against my body at nights. She was so alive and yet so simple when she slept, she looked happiest when she was sleeping. Nothing could hurt her. My favourite nights were the ones where we talked for hours and then lay in silence, only hearing our heartbeats in the room. Her heartbeat. The one I loved so much.

She had the best heart of anyone I knew, and probably ever will. And now what's left?