Outerspace "I can still taste the ocean like it was today" It was only the second date, and I took you to the beach. I had it planned out to the hour, minute, second, every breath taken was another crucial moment. The roof of the car was down and the air sweeped between us, adding to the exhilaration of speeding along the empty road, the cliche temptations to let your arms rise and feel it in the air too. The beach was deserted and you gripped my hand as we made our way to the sand, not stopping when we felt the water around our feet. The sound of the waves hitting rocks filled our ears and all we saw was the horizon and eachother. By the time the sun began to set, as quickly as it rose, we were both soaking wet, cold from the iciness of the water. You gripped onto my shirt for warmth, as if it was the only thing keeping you from falling underneath the rising tide. We had our first kiss at that beach, the saltiness on your lips burned in my head, and the soft grips of your fingertips in my shoulders. I remember it so vividly, looking back at you as we gently pulled away, lips red and cheeks flushed. You whispered something that I didnt catch, but for fear of ruining the moment, I stayed silent and kissed you again. This happened a lot. "You said please keep on holding your hands" You rung me at 21am with soft sobs creeping through the phone and by 2:13 am I had you in my car on the way back home. You held onto my hand the whole way, and if I tried to pull away to change gears, you squeezed even harder. You told me about the nightmares that night, and I told you that you would be okay, even though I didnt quite know. I finally fell asleep that night at 4:28am and you slept the whole way through, holding my hands, cold and shaky. You stayed for a while, it felt like longer than 4 days but then again, with you every moment felt like it was out of touch with reality, some sort of dream that didnt have a sense of time. "And the rain, it came too soon" After a couple of months, I could tell something was up but I never wanted to press it. The distance you put between us, the kisses that you gave half-heartedly, the hands you didnt hold. I should've noticed and I should've asked but my own pride overcame me and I could never bring myself to say the words. It was our 397th day of being boyfriend and girlfriend, and also our last day of being boyfriend and girlfriend. The clothes had been removed from the wardrobe and the key was in its place. A note on the table replaced a text sent the night before, and this time the kisses at the end were gone too. You'd written that you'd met somebody else, and I wondered what it was that I didnt give, couldnt give. I wanted to know his name, how he managed to take you from me, why you'd let him. I wanted to know what it was that meant I wasnt good enough anymore, but I never found out. "I will wait for you to love me again" It took me 4 days to finally leave my bed, the same amount of days you laid there when you first slept round. I haven't heard from you since the 397th day of our relationship, and I haven't seen you since the day before. I refused to let myself turn to intoxication for refuge but then I found myself sat amongst 3 empty bottles on my bathroom floor one night and it didn't numb the pain like I thought it would. A little over a year doesn't seem like much but I expected a #lifetime of fatuation with you, and it seems we thought differently. The alcohol takes over my system as my limbs flop to the floor, and my tidy bed is abandoned again, as it has been for the past 6 weeks. The love will not go, and in my drunken stupor, I make a promise to myself to never fall out of love with you, but wait for the day when you will love me again, and come home to me again. "I guess I was running from something" I never remembered the nights before, when I'd wake with a heavy head and aching limbs. My self-pity meant that the feeling of being lost, out of control and utterly free was worth any hangover. I was wrong, of course, because the feeling was false and only lasted a short amount of time, nothing to provide me with relief from the constant ache in my chest. The alcohol meant I could get away from reality, run away from everyday-thoughts and clear myself. It gave me an escape from you, because every waking moment you invade my thoughts. It's an unhealthy way to deal with an unhealthy relationship and it seems perfect. "I was running back to you" It escalated into going out every night, intoxicating myself every night, it took chemicals to make me realise that I cannot run away any more, and if I shall, it will be to you. In the rare occasions where I'm sober, isolation takes over and I shut myself away in my room of the flat that we shared, crinkling the sheets of the bed we shared. The realisation that I am still truly in love with you keeps haunting me along with the background voice telling me that the drinking won't do anything. It won't do anything at all. I want to find you, and I want to love you again, but I dont know where to start. I start to map out all the possible places you could be, along with pouring myself another drink, blocking out the voice expertly. "Lost here in London with nothing" I had no money and no job, so venturing out to London on a whim was ridiculously risky because there was a large possibility that I wouldn't find my way back home. The coldness of the city reminded me of your hands, and your heart. The icy wind brought me back down to earth and I questioned why I was here, lost in a city I've never been to, seeking a girl who no longer loves me, a girl who left me. With no clue of direction, I walked the streets helplessly for a while before crumpling against a wall in defeat, pulling at my hair with gloved hands. "I'm still running back to you" The passion to see you again was stronger, but I gave up looking for you. It became a mental need, one for me to experience and only me. I still longed for the touch of your fingertips and the taste of your skin, and the pain still floods my mind when I think of the note on the kitchen worktop, looming with what I'd feared. "If you could love me again I could let go of everything" I poisoned myself one night, and I was taken to hospital in an ambulance because over my alcohol consumption. At the time, it seemed severe and #life-threatening, but after 2 days, when I was released from hospital and drips and needles, I found myself back with a bottle of liquor and a sorry heart. "If I was an island in search of castaways" It had been a whole year since the 397th day of our relationship, and I wondered what you were doing. Whether you were still with the man who toom your heart, or whether you'd found another. Maybe you too hadn't been able to move on, and maybe you too struggled to cope with the harshness of #life. I wondered whether you thought of me still, whether something still reminded you of me, like a nickname or a habit. I used to be so sure that I'd find you; yet it took me so long to realise that maybe you didn't want to be found. But maybe you still loved me. "Maybe I'll find you here and the rain, it came too soon" I used to visit places that reminded me of you, like the beach and the tucked-away and overpriced coffee shops. I think I subconsciously hoped I'd see you there, sat at a table waiting for me, like it was almost too good to be true. I'd hang around for a while, and then the weather would change from sunshine to dark clouds as I remembered that you didn't love me anymore, and I wasn't going to find you at the beach, hair blowing gently in the wind as you wiggled your toes deeper into the sand. I realised that I would never get to watch you scoop the foam off the coffee with your finger and comically suck it off, athempting a mock-seduction whilw we both spluttered and giggled beehind our drinks. It's times like those where I seek out the place I know can give me a moment to wallow in my self-pity and sadness and it's in a bottle. "The darkest night never felt so bright with you by my side" I remember the nights we shared, your head on my chest as our whispers got lost in the darkness of the night, small beams of light seeping through the curtains, streetlights and stars to blame. Those night were my favourites, they wete more intimate than any physical love could being simply because of how truthful and "together" we felt at that time. You felt complete against my chest, as I held you tight, your hair gently tickling my chin. I remember when we made our way onto a rooftop, likely to have been illegal, and we laid out beneath the stars, murmuring and gazing at eachother in a soft daze from the expensive wine from a mediocre dinner. We believed we had counted the stars that night, and when you finished, I told you that you had forgotten one. In frustration, your arms crossed and you refused to recount the glittering dots in the sky. I never told you that the final star was the brightest of them all, and it was right next to me the whole night. "Nothing like the rain when you're in outerspace" With you, it felt like I had finally found a home, a place where I belonged, free from the harm and pain in the world - I felt safe. We worked so well together, so strong and so in love that nothing else really mattered, our outlook was carefree and full of compassion. In the blur of everyday #life, jobs and housework and business and rent, you were my balance and you were my central point where I could focus on nothing but you, I could simply block out the rest of the world, the visuals, the sounds, the feelings, everything but you. It was special. "Love me like you did" After a year and 10 months, I finally stop seeking for an escape in liquor, and although I celebrate my achievement with alcohol, I swear it to be the final time the drug touches my tongue. A week later and I kept my promise. Being sober was the second hardest thing I'd had to do, and it didn't feel good at all, leaving me wondering what the appeal of it was at all. When I was under the illusion of alcohol, I could let go and forget what I wanted but now, thoughts are harder to block, and I'm learning that the hard way. Each night I spend sober and tossing in bed is another night I lay in anguish and desire for the taste of the liquid on my tongue, and the harshness of the fact that you are completely out of my #life is even sharper now that I have full consciousness. "I'll give you anything" My heart hangs heavy in my chest and it feels as if it's resting on top of my lungs, weighing them down so I can't find air to breathe properly. It's times like these where giving up seems the best option when I remember my previous attempts at giving up, and I give up on the idea of giving up. Sometimes I wish that I'd never met you, purely because I would be free from all this hurt and pain you have caused me, but on the other hand, having you in my #life has made me feel more alive than any fresh breath of oxygen does. And at this moment in time, being alive is rather important because you always used to tell me a #quote about #life and death, and I always forget it, but my own memory tells me that I was a good #quote, and anything assosciated with you is a good enough reason to keep living.

• this is what id like to say • “this is what i’d like to say to this boy. i’m not gonna hide anything, he’s not gonna bother to come and see me tell you this anyway. when i met you, it was like the clouds in my head had separated and i could finally, finally, see light for once. there was no rain, no snow, no hail, there was just sunshine. i loved how your hair curled slightly behind your ears, how your shoulders shook when you laughed too hard, how when you smiled it curved at the edges just ever so slightly but if it was straight it would make such a huge difference. you asked me out one afternoon and i said yes. but i went home, and i called you telling you i’d go out with you. i called you two more times after that until i said it the way i wanted to remember it, and i told you i was sorry for calling so much because my obsessive compulsive disorder made me. and then you said it was okay. when you knocked on my door to pick me up, i was tying my shoes. so i opened it and went back to tying my shoes, but i untied them and retied them and undid them and redid them and undid them and redid them and undid them and redid them until i knew i wouldn’t have to stop our conversation so i could tie them and untie them and retie them and untie them and retie them. when you told me you loved me for the first time i told you i loved you back but i didn’t say it the right way. so i apologized and said it again and again and again, i love you too, i love you too, i love you too, i love you too, i love you too. you smiled and said it was okay, and that you loved how i kept telling you. you loved how i told you i loved you so many times, and how i kissed you so many times. you loved how i kept drawing and redrawing and redrawing and redrawing and redrawing and redrawing my contemporary art project, and you were so happy when i told you i got an ‘a+' on it. at my graduation, as student council they wanted me to say a speech but i couldn’t because i knew that i would say it over and over and over and over and over and over and over until i got it right, so you said you would read it for me. and it was perfect the very first time you did it. you asked me to move in with you, so i did. and you loved how i said goodnight 26 times, and how i got up to lock the door 13 times before finally going to bed. you said you loved how i would hold your hand as you wrapped your arms around me, and if i woke up and we weren’t in that position, i’d move us into that position. you told me you loved how when i made coffee in the morning it took me so long because it had to taste perfect but i knew i couldn’t do it over and over and over. you told me you loved me. you told me you loved me you loved me you loved me and i loved you back. rewind, last month you told me you loved me but you didn’t have that small sparkle in your voice when you said it. and i told you i loved you back and said it until it sounded like i meant it, but afterwards you didn’t smile. instead of waiting for me to make you coffee, you went to the coffee shop up the road and bought one, you bought one, you bought one, you bought one. and rewind, you didn’t come home last week. you came home three days ago at four thirty seven in the morning, and i know it was thirty seven seconds into the minute cause i didn’t sleep at all that week, counting and counting and counting and counting and counting until you came home. you called me crazy for staying up all night and now that you were home i could go to sleep. i didn’t. i waited and waited and waited and waited until you went to bed. you didn’t wrap your arms around me, or hold my hand, or tangle our legs together. you slept on the far right side of the bed and i slept on the left right side like i always did, but you weren’t there on the middle left side to hold me through the night. rewind, yesterday morning you told me that i needed to get you off my mind but i can’t i can't i can't i can't i can't i can't i can't and you don’t realize that i don’t get addicted to things like i got addicted to you. i didn’t get addicted to things until i met you. and now you’re gone. your antique copy of moby dick i bought for your 19th birthday is missing from my bookshelf with the movies on it, and i haven’t moved over the other DVDs cause thats not where they belong. you gave me a video tape of our first christmas together, and i watched it over and over and over and over last night. so now its just my graduation speech. and since last night ive watched it 16 times. you rang me this morning and told me you were coming over so you could pick up that tape, and i hung up to stop myself from saying i love you i love you i love you i love you. i left it on the cabinet next to the bookshelf with a cup of coffee just the way you like it, and my emily brontë novel because 2 years ago you said you'd read it if i sang to you that night and you forgot you forgot you forgot you forgot. i left the book next to the black tape and i’m wearing the crimson shirt you left me in, and the bed is left the way it was when you stopped sleeping next to me. i haven’t washed my hands after i touched someone since june 11th, 2012 when you told me you loved me. but today i washed my hands 19 times before touching this microphone because i can’t keep the touch of someone who’s not you on me.”

• Miss Me • avoiding gazes staring at the floor faking smiles drowning near the shore nobody's there she's all alone didn't say a word how could anyone have known

• My Love • I know that he'll never speak my name at 2am when he's in between sleep I know he'll never lose his breath when I walk in the room I know he'll never grip my waist and pull me into a kiss that makes him forget about the whole world for just a minute And I know I'll never get to be 'that girl' but one day some girl somewhere will be lucky enough to intertwine her fingers through his poke his dimples with her fingertips stick a finger through his curls give him things that are worth singing about. one day a girl will steal his heart and leave him breathless. he'll fall head over heels he'll love her with all that he has and darling, I hope she makes you happy.

• Home • someone asked me to describe home I almost said your name but I stayed quiet people expect you to say a place but I felt more at home in your arms than I ever have in my own home