Maybe One Day

6

We loved cheap thrills. Things we could get up to in the small hours of the morning. Things that could get us in trouble. Things that we could do with a cigarette between our teeth, things that we could run from, things we could make out next to. We lived for silly things, we drove on and off the freeway just to see where we ended up. We mainly followed her lead seeing as she was the one in control.

I knew deep down I could never make her happy. I knew deep down but I somehow convinced myself that I could. I somehow convinced myself that we could kiss and adventure and drink coffee and scream and be happy. But I always knew, I was always kidding myself. She thickened the air in my car with her smoke and only cried when the air was so thick she thought I couldn't see, but I always saw. I put my hand on her thigh and squeezed it gently.

She brought CD's and played them once we'd stopped. She pulled open all the doors and put the radio on full volume. She would dance to things like Nirvana and I would watch, amazed. When she wanted me we would dance and kiss and I would spin us until we were dizzy and we would lie on the floor and watch the stars until they stopped spinning.

There was never a time where we said we were a couple. There was never a time where I introduced her as my girlfriend. We never met each other's parents or had anniversary dinners. We lay side by side on the floor, or the bed, or the roof of the car and just felt each other's presence.

In a way I had always wanted to meet her parents and introduce her as my girlfriend and take her to anniversary dinners. I wanted it, but I never said it. I always treated her like ceramic, scared that the smallest crack would break her. People knew I was in love. My mum and sister knew from day one. But they never met her. Not really. And I felt sad about that because they would have loved her.

Cheap thrills. Like lighting fires to keep warm in places where we weren't meant to. Like singing and playing air guitar by starlight, always with a cigarette between our teeth. We lived for those.

Ironic really.