tea.

Dear Darling, dear Cariad, dear Scruffs, dear Heart,

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It's been a long, long while since we've used any of these names for each other. They used to be as natural as breathing.
And sometimes, instead of oxygen, we breath out an antiquated endearment and you look at me as if I should know the answer, but in reality - I don't even know what the question is.

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I don't know how to bring the joy back into your November storm eyes in the same way that you don't know what causes me to jerk awake at night any more.
I don't know how to make that concrete jungle feel like home for you in the same way that you don't know the people that I talk about with such affection.
We'd both love to know the answers, but we both know that it isn't our place to ask. We used to be so intimate, and I still can't sleep on your side of the bed without wondering where you are, but we shone, we shone so fucking bright, and we imploded.

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And that's okay.

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When people ask what happened to us, I tell them that we fell apart. Which is the truth, but not the entire truth. We didn't fall so much as shatter. Shrapnel exploded from the space we left behind, and we both hide the scars under easy smiles and the arm that you throw around my shoulders. No hard feelings. No feelings at all.
When they ask, I say that you're doing well, that I don't see you much since you moved to London, which is true.
But they don't know about the way that your lips found mine, again and again and again, months after we'd thrown our grand finale.
There was a forest in my heart, and I'd carved your name into every tree.

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This is true:

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In later years, she won’t remember the name of the hall with the long, sweeping drive. She will remember that it was lined with ancient silver birches, the bark peeling off of them in white, ribbon-like spirals.

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She will remember the way that he reaches for her hand over the gear stick and the way that he moans when she changes the radio station. She is as comfortable with him as she is in her favourite pair of jeans. She has been for a long, long time.
She won’t remember the stiffness that she feels that night, surrounded by people that she doesn’t know. She will remember the way that her dress grazes the floor, and the way that the veins in his hands looked as she helped to put his cufflinks on.

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It is not the first time that they have worn each other for a parade. It will not be the last. She stands at his arm like a perceived trophy, he stands at hers as an apparent accessory.

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This is also true:
They are each other’s everything, and that everything would be nothing without them.

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She won’t remember the monotony of the dinner. She will remember the way that the lights shine on the crystalline chandelier, how it is almost gaudy in it’s splendour.
She will remember the way that he leans towards her and whispers “Scarper?”
She won’t remember the way that her lips quirk upwards at the mere suggestion, the way that she nods once before turning to make her excuses to the dinner guest on her right.
He will.

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This is true:
The way that they lose themselves as they try to make their way back to their allocated room will be something that comes to her before sleep for years to come.

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This is also true:
They don’t want to be found.

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The ballroom that they wander into feels clandestine with the low lighting, angled at the paintings gracing the walls.
She has always been one step ahead of him.
There is half of a hushed sentence on her lips as she turns back to look for him in the dark. It dies and fall like leaves when he reaches out a hand for her.
She meets him halfway; After all, it’s been a long time since she asked “Why?” rather than just taking hold.

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With no music, they are not elegant dancers.
He is six foot two and yet still seems stocky. She is willow thin and violently right-footed.
But God, they give it everything. The hall is theirs, they are exhausted, and yet he lifts her with such sure hands as she throws her arms out wide. To the beat of their own hearts, she pulls away and spins back to his chest, dress flying out around her legs. They play cat and mouse across the vast floor, and she won’t remember the way that her stilettos rub but she will always remember his smile as their feet play out a one, two, three rhythm.
They are not elegant dancers, but they are very much in love.

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Here is the lie:
At this stage in time, they are not falling apart.

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This mountain lies a little ways North of where I live. It makes up part of the iconic Snowdonian mountain range, and it's called Cadair Idris.

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Cadair Idris translates directly to Idris's Chair, because legend has it that the giant, Idris, made the mountain his throne and he would sit and gaze at the stars. It's also said that it is the hunting grounds of Gwyn ap Nudd, the Celtic Lord of the Under World, and his spectral hounds the Cŵn Annwn. On hearing these huge dog’s howls, it would foretell the death of those who heard it and the pack then swept up that person’s soul, herding it into the underworld.

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Added to this, several of the great lakes found in the surrounds of the mountain (such as Llyn Cau on Cadiar Idris itself) are said to be bottomless.

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And of course, anyone who makes the mistake of falling asleep on a Welsh mountainside either wakes up a poet, a madman - or they simply never wake up at all.

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I'd say that I lean far more towards "street smarts" than "book smarts".

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I'm not an academic person. It doesn't come naturally to me and I have to really force myself to get assignments done and the required reading finished (Finished meaning skimmed. I don't think I've been able to concentrate properly since they put all of my coursework texts online.)

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Which isn't to say that I'm a bad student - I try so hard, I panic, I cry, I have nightmares about it - but I'm not gifted. If I feel that I'm having to jump through hoops that are going to be utterly pointless in later life, I get somewhat resentful. And eat a lot of chocolate to try and bribe myself through it - So really, studying is bad for me. I swear.

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"Street smarts" have always been the better valued by my mother, and that influenced me a lot as a kid. My brother and I grew up in search of "wow" moments - We travelled a lot, we met a lot of people and our home environment wasn't great. There was no safety net, so we had to land on our feet. There wasn't any other option.
When I was spotted by my NGO, I started travelling a lot by myself and with a group of teenagers who quickly became like family to me or a pain in my backside. And more experiences were had, but several of those have been left most of the way across Europe, which is a comfort!

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I don't think I'd want to be any more academic. It would probably do me good, but at least if I know that I have to work bloody hard for it then I'll end up doing what I want.

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Why would you ask that question attached to that character, Candace?! The pain D;

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I'm a great believer in karma and chain reactions. One of my friends works her ass off as a sports officer, and last summer she was taken into hospital with Appendicitis which turned to Sepsis. It was awful. She was in intensive care for a month. No-one had any contacts for her family and she wasn't contactable, so we had no clue if she was still with us. We had no idea until she finally answered a text after that month in the ICU.

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She's only just back up and about now, and I was chatting to her last week. She said that being hospitalised that seriously forced her to slow down - she'd been pushing herself so violently that her body just demanded a break.

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And if Nic could see a reason for it, then bless her. Some things I will always struggle with. The loss of a child, for instance, is one tragedy that I will never be able to reason with.

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Light shines on glass in the most peculiar of ways. It's possibly a testament to the way that it's created - life is blown into the molten material, it is pulled at with tongs and shaped and manipulated with hot breaths and shocked into solidity by submerging it in ice cold water.
The heart of an infant is something truly spectacular. Unblemished, unmarked, with only the soft yellow of youth pulsating in it's centre. The heart of a child is simple - the whorls of glass are gentle and unassuming.

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Scratches, chips, abuse; We accumulate an arsenal of damage to our hearts as we grow older. We live for the moments when our hearts surge with the warmth that makes the glass feel warm, that makes cultivating life possible. We live for the people that cause new, intricate magnifications to curl around slim sinews.
Others looking at our own hearts becomes such a terrifying prospect. We cover them so that the darkness that has gathered and which still lingers is hidden. We cover them so that the blushing pink of new love is closeted. We cover them so that the dark, lustrous red of sin is buried.

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We cover them because while singers can break glass by hitting high notes, the simplest way to shatter a glass is by dropping it.

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And broken glass is just like glitter, isn't it?

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