Absolute

Adjective

1.     1.Complete, Utter, Perfect. 2. Unconditional.

Is there any more fitting description?

I cannot think of a single part of me that has not been enhanced by you, and shaped by you, and changed by you. I used to think it was weak to change for a person; weak to become somebody other than yourself because of a man, or a woman, and a romantic’s perception of love.

I think, though, that I was changed the first moment I saw you. I watched you pivot on a staircase at the sound of my voice, and I was changed, not for you, but because of you.

Who could have known what we were beginning, with your outstretched hand and you “My name’s Blaine”?

Who could have known then that this would become our absolute?

*

Accompaniment

Noun.

I still remember the first time you played as I sang. I remember the look on your face, the way you bit your lip to stop yourself from singing along.

(I wouldn’t have minded).

Whenever I get nervous, I remember your hands at the piano. You were so in tune with me. Every time I slowed down, or skipped a beat, you were right there, carrying me on the wave of your accompaniment.

It was one of the things I was most scared of, when I stopped performing. If I wasn’t singing, by default it meant you couldn’t play along.

I shouldn’t have worried though, should I? In life now, as in music then, I know that if my voice falters and I stall, you’ll be there, ready to make sure the audience never even notices.

Sometimes, maybe, I stop on purpose, just to watch you save me again. Just so you get a chance to prove that your song is as strong as mine.

I could listen to you play forever.

* 

Addicted

Adjective

I could never get enough.

When I was 18 and you were 17, and we were made of sweat, and stardust, and each other, I literally could not get enough.

I remember the bruises, like trophies, where you’d close the door and seconds later I’d be pinned against it, clinging for dear life to the doorknob, knees weak as I inhaled my fix of you.

And it was never quite enough.

I worried, quietly, when the time came that we were able to be alone together without ripping at each other’s clothes. I worried that we’d lost our ember; that pretty soon the fire would go out completely.

I worried that in every moment that passed where we weren’t skin to skin, I was a little bit closer to losing you.

There is something they should tell you though, about addiction: it never goes away.

It never goes away, but life intervenes, and the spare hours become spare minutes, and we learn better how to control it.

But when you smile at me, the special smile, one part home and family, one part like you’re seeing me for the first time, all of that faked immunity crumbles.

It all just fades, and I’m reaching for you, and the second your fingertips touch mine I’m back there, and I am 18 and you are 17, and this will never expire, and this will never be enough.

And so you know? I’m fine with that.

* 

Aisle

Noun

I watched you once, on the phone to your brother, walking slowly up and down the kitchen. You were doing that thing where you bite your lip to concentrate, nodding at the half of the conversation I couldn’t hear.

It was just a Thursday night. You were wearing pyjama bottoms, and glasses, and one of my old t-shirts. The tv was on in the living room, but neither of us were watching it.

It didn’t feel like a moment that would become a Moment.

I stood in the doorway and just watched you, and as you walked from one end of the kitchen to the other, you must have sensed that I was there. You looked up, and you caught my eye, and you smiled.

And that was all it took.

In that curve of your lips, our kitchen became an aisle, and with every step you took towards me at the end of it, I became more sure.

That is when I knew I would marry you.

* 

Ascend

Verb

With every day that passes, I know you more.

With every day that passes, I worship you more.

This will be our legacy; our ascent seems slow, only because the limits of our love are nonexistent.