tea.

Hey there, Day.

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Firstly, Happy Christmas. I hope that you're surrounded by the people that you love, I hope that you can sit back and watch and get that sudden "Shit, I'm happy." I hope that all of your demons have laid down and gone to sleep, or that you have met them, shaken hands with them, and gone separate ways. I hope that for once in your life you aren't sporting a new (or old, you never did discriminate) injury.
But above all else, I hope that you're happy.

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Anyway, this wasn't meant to be some sappy letter where I spill my guts. This was meant to be an excuse to say hi. I've missed you. I'd love to hear what you've been up to, and which characters have made their way into your story. Because God, four years of friendship don't go away easy. Four fucking years.
And okay, to those who are like "Psht, what. I grew up with my friends. We practically came out of the womb just across the hall from each other." it might not sound like much. But I don't hang around. I've known you longer than I've known most others, and it kind of hurts that you aren't around anymore. I can fight most things - I'm a tooth and nail kind of girl - but I cannot take on the American armed forces. I could try! But I probably wouldn't get very far. Mostly because of your stance on tea.

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I started this because I have been thinking about it for weeks. There's been this mass of words unsaid. So, thank you. Thank you for being there when I was a wreck. Thank you for the immeasurable laughs. Thank you for helping me to write stories that we had no idea that we were writing. Thank you for teaching me that there's a hundred different ways to look at the world. Thank you for the motivation. Thank you for making reality a bigger and better place. Thank you for treating me in the way that I will teach my sons to treat women. Thank you for helping to stitch up wounds and thank you for not leaving until you absolutely had to.

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And thank you for Halsey. Her voice is better than sex.
Have a wonderful New Year, love.

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Natasha
xxx

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1. It has two arms. My right is more powerful than my left. They've been worked on until I can do 40-50 push-ups on the trot, or hug smallies, or spin kids around, or carry my dog over gates when she can't crawl under them.

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2. It has two legs as well. My knees are covered in a multitude of scars and sometimes I'm self conscious about them. My left Achilles is delicate, I have weak ankles, and thighs that are trained 25 hours a week.

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3. My mum paid a ridiculous amount of money to get my teeth treatment three years ago. So I take really good care of them now. Like, paranoiac care.

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4. I have two eyes. They're actually my grandmama's. The optician told me that I had fighter pilot vision and I was all "so cool" and then walked into a car wing mirror.

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5. I got my belly button pierced in a fit of rebellion and shamelessly love it.

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6. Right now I have four gaping holes in my left hand and it HURTS. So it's all bandaged up and I am making a hell of a fuss.

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7. I am constantly torn between growing my hair out or chopping it all off.

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8. I broke my nose when I was seven, and for years and years and years I hated the shape of it. But I'm learning to love it, so. Baby steps.

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I adore the way that you phrased this one, lovely ♥

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1.
Lies used to come incredibly naturally to me.
This was before he caught my arm when I whirled away and told me to stop, slow down, breathe. This was before everything changed. This was a time when a sandy haired boy told me that I was pretty, but his hands told me that I wasn't pretty enough. His mouth left bruises on my neck, on my collarbones. His hands left bruises on my thighs, on my upper arms.
"What's going on with you?"
"I've got it under control."
"Talk to me."
I did.

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2.
My family is complicated.
I have changed my surname three times. Three times, and I am still tied to a surname that is draped around me like a cape of vermilion whenever they expect me to stand still and smile.
I have trophies that I date by which name is carved onto them. I have family pictures that I date by when certain figures become notably absent.
My family is complicated, and it has left me with a pockmarked history that refuses to let me go.
And sometimes, when my head is too full, when my hands turn to fists and the noises turns loud, turns aggressive, turns the world to a place that I don't recognise - He's there. He doesn't say anything.
He turns my wrist over, puts his thumb to my pulse point.
It slows.

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I wish I could say "Why no, I'm a perfectly well balanced teenager! I've never considered psychotherapy in my life!"
But that would be kind of a lie on account of me not always being this shining example of cold logic and well-thought out choices.
I mean, there was the time when I had that eating disorder and my Mum was like "Therapy!" and then there were the nightmares and my Mum was like "Therapy!" and then there was my parents divorce and my Mum was like "Therapy!"
And I managed to avoid therapy on all but one of those occasions because I am a stubborn toddler and very, very good at airily waving a hand and going "Psht, it's no biggie."

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Story time, though!
When I first started dating Sam - and we'd been friends for a gazillion odd years beforehand - I went around for dinner at his place and to get to know his parents. I'm in full-social mode, complete with 600 watt smile, and go "So what do you both work as?"
And his Mum goes, "Well, I'm a psychologist working with disturbed youths."
And his Step-Dad goes, "I'm a psychiatrist specialising in clinical psychology."
My appetite shrivelled up and died, has to be said. I haven't been as nervous before or since.

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When I was eight, I had to tell the class what my favourite colour was.
Everybody had a favourite colour, it shouldn't have been a biggie. It should have been no problem.
But even then - at eight years old - I couldn't decide.
I settled on the colour of my dog's collar, of my blazer, of the ribbon around the hat that I wore, of the stripes on my tie that intermingled with the gold. I told the class that these were the reasons that this colour was my favourite, and I got a merit star.
So overall, it was a success. But it never really felt like my favourite.

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Tuesdays are my favourite. The number 36 is my favourite. I prefer right to left, salt to pepper, chocolate to vanilla and day to night.
All of these are things that I /know/.
I don't know why I know.
I just do.
Eight year old me just did.
But to choose just one colour? When there were so many to chose from? That was heartbreaking.

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When I was eighteen, I lay in the curve of his arms and I told him that he was my favourite colour.
He had this way of laughing without making a sound, you know? His finger traced a pattern over my bare back, and he laughed silently.
"Tell me." he said. So, I did.
I told him that he was the colour of his eyes - that he was the sudden dark of storm clouds in April, that he was the sun-bright glints on a river that I could touch but wouldn't dream of changing. His hand stilled and I could feel him breathing. I could feel him listening. I told him that he was the colour of the waves that I sailed over and ran my hands through, but that those same waves were more powerful than anything mankind could hope to harness. He was the colour of the sea from my aunt's windows in Dorset, he was the quiet at ten pm in July when the world turned dusky.

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Now I am nineteen.
I don't have a favourite colour again.
I go through life holding out my hands and colours drip through them. I am enchanted by royal colours - by rich reds, luxurious purples, the ochre of a dying sun and the gold of a child's christening ring. I am comforted by pastel roses. I am inspired by white.
And my hands are coloured by the rainbow, and they may be devoid of his but they have never felt more full.

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[Part one because ask.fm is being a numpty and I'm determined to fit in everything I wrote about Tash by Fall Out Boy]

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Okay so I'm doing this on behalf of Tash and she's loving Halsey’s album right now. I figured this particular verse from the song Colors in the album does Tash a little justice:
“You’re dripping like a saturated sunrise”
There’s some people you meet, and once you have, they get into your heart and won't go. You don’t want them to go. For anyone who’s met her, it’s Tasha. With her, it’s as if all my life I’ve been seeing the world in black and white, and when I met Tasha, I began to experience everything re-rendered in brilliant technicolour. And I swear to God, it’s not just me she’s left feeling like that.
People, and myself included make a point of observing the colours of the day at either sunrise or sunset, but I’ve noticed that a day consists of multitudes of shades and intonations. Palest amber-pinks to deepest flaming reds. What I’m trying to say is, Tasha’s a lot like that. She bathes the world in colour.

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Tasha makes you feel things. She unknowingly says things that you don't know about yourself. Her words stir parts of your soul, and she puts into words everything that’s ever seemed incomprehensible to you. Her words make the thoughts in your head, the worries, the joys, all the feelings you kept to yourself because you couldn’t find any language to describe them in, she makes all of it come to life. She writes the words most of us can’t say. In doing so, she makes you feel a little less alone when you need it most. She makes you feel like you’re not going through anything alone.

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She doesn't think there's any point in wasting time being sad or pitying yourself. Don’t get me wrong, she understands that we’re human and bound to get sad but she doesn't let things weigh her down. And it's so admirable. She makes you want to be a happier and more content person, because she doesn't take anything for granted you know?

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She only wants the best for people, because she doesn't like seeing people waste their life away and no gold stars for guessing she worries an unnecessary amount due to that, but it’s sort of her ‘thing’. If you go to her about a problem of yours, she makes it her problem and she'll always be there when you're being a fucking prick and pitying yourself for seven months too many. And sometimes you might feel down, and everything just seems a little bleak and dull, but her sheer excitement about the world transfers itself onto everything you see, and makes it brighter. She makes you feel like you deserve the world, and somehow she has this freakish ability to effortlessly make it a better place to live in.

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[Part two]

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She listens because she genuinely cares and she makes an effort to remember things. She doesn't just ask you questions about your day or your life or what makes you tick because she's making conversation. She does it to find out about you. She's actually present you know? She’s not really there for small talk, she’s there to learn about you.

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And there's no bullshitting her. She sees right through it. She just /knows/. If anyone's watched Suits on here, then you'll know of Donna, and I couldn't quite put my finger on it at first but that's what Tasha's like. She's fiercely loyal, and protective of her friends and family (of most importance being her pup, Wispa), and she's damn good at it.

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She’s breaking the mould with her family, and she’s doing a hell of a job at it, but if I make the mistake of going into too much detail about that, she’ll delete this. She wants to make her own way in life, and I think sometimes she doesn’t realise that she’s already done so much for herself without the help of the family name. After all, she was ‘Captin’ of an international badminton team whilst being just a Dancing Queen. There’s far and few people who can say that about themselves.

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So here's to you Tasha, you inspirational tit. Though maybe not a tit because I hear a lot of people think tits are nice. I’m going to stop now yikes, so here’s to you. *clinks glass* (I feel like a glass should be clinked at this point?)

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Always,
Habiba (yes the surname really is that bad) x

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