stardust & silk

N O V E M B E R.

i.

"I just realised something," he says one day when we're sitting on the edge of a cliff watching the people scream and squeal and splash around on the beach below, the sudden realisation crashing into him harder than the waves that sounded like thunder on the rocks beneath us.

"Hmm?" I hum, my gaze drifting away from the seagulls that were swooping over the ocean and over to him as he lazily swings an arm around my shoulders. "And what's that?" I ask.

"I've realised that home and love aren't very different to each other in any way other than the arrangement of their consonants."

"Is that so?" I muse, as he twirls a lock of my hair between his fingers, staring down at me as though I were the ending to his favourite book.

"Yeah," he nods eagerly, eyes brighter than the fireworks on New Years. "Home isn't just four walls with windows and a roof. And love isn't just two hands with a blinding smile and a heart that beats just for you. It's all of that and none of it."

"Explain please," I say, a frown marring my features as I try to make sense of his words.

"They complement each other, see," he begins, twisting to face me so that we were nothing more than four eyes and entwined limbs sitting atop a cliff on the waterside. "Home is the sound of your best friends laughter after you've finally made her smile at two o'clock in the morning when she'd been crying since midnight and love is answering her call even though you'd been getting ready for bed. Home is riding in the car with all the windows down in the middle of autumn and love is letting someone else choose the music. Home is your favourite book and love is someone who reads it just because you asked them to. Home is seeing your mum cooking breakfast in the morning, and love is offering to do the dishes so she can get some rest. Home is going to a sports game with your family because your brother will be playing and love is being proud even though you'd had a fight with him not ten minutes earlier. They're the little things, you see?" he smiles down at me.

"Things like the way your nose twitches when your angry," I grin up at him, understanding dawning in my eyes. "Home is the way you sleepily mutter the words 'I love you' when you're half asleep on the other end of the phone and there doesn't seem to be any connection between your tongue and your brain. And love is when you repeat them the next morning, wide awake and in person."

"The little things," he nods, "the things you might not remember a month from now, but that doesn't mean they don't matter. They do, they matter more than the bigger things in life because when they come together under a single roof filled with laughter and tears and silly little arguments over the lyrics of a song, you know in your heart that you'd never want to be anywhere else."

ii.

My friends tell me it's not healthy, pining after a boy who toyed with my heart for entertainment. So i think it's time I forget your name the way you're sure to have already forgotten mine.

iii.

Maybe endings and beginnings aren't as clear-cut as I'd thought. And maybe some things have to end before something better can take their place, because just as I'd decided it was time to close your door, he walked into my life and, my God, he shined bright.

iv.

He doesn't seem to know it but his smile makes gravity fail. like, suddenly everything is upside down and I finally understand what that Tom Petty song means. I feel my heart free falling into his arms.