City Break

On a once-precious, still-precious Saturday afternoon I sit and remember us...

The pressure I applied to capture those days only served to crush them
As though I were a cup emptying itself with sheer eagerness to contain water.

On a long, tiring journey to Paris you cuddled into me
Curling up with a blanket I would never have thought to bring.
I formed the happiest pillow for there was something redemptive
About purity choosing to rest upon me.

Innumerable fascinated and intertwined lovers had passed this way before
But that could never detract from the beauty we threw at this romantic cliché.

City break, they call it. The concept sold to us, encouraged by social media
By the expectation of what lovers should do and by my own projection
Of completing a vision of the pair of us in love.

Well, on the second day the city began to break me.

The stonework, the architecture, the history, the crowds of
Beautiful ensouled humans did not break me and nor did you.

Instead the dull ache that began as a result of the bus journey rose to a pitch
That maddened me in a way we failed to understand.

Our days became filled with compulsory walking
Sublime hot chocolate and Parisienne patisseries served
Only to punctuate the feverish limping from attraction to attraction.

Co-codamol and tensions that never existed before affixed themselves to our routine.

The photo's we took never captured this and the filtered lens of expectations ensured
No trace other than the moments of joy was ever immortalised.

Returning to a call centre filled with all that is wrong and lonely
I continued to work through the pain even as it increased along with the dose of
Codeine that choked me and caused me to itch

You remained.

You held my hand at night with more efficacy in your brave fight against my pain
Than any opiate could ever have.

You counted with me.

Breaths, in for four, out for seven. I love you.

Sleep became an impossibility as did lying on a mattress that could give beneath me.
Anxiety and disability fell upon me, crushing the stoic within.

And still you remained.

My left sciatic nerve was dying and so were we.

After numerous doctors, scans and assessments we were no closer to a solution or cause
And ever more desperate.

One night when I could barely move or remember our intimacy
When the left side of my groin and penis were completely numb
I gave myself to you.

We cried as we made love and you asked over and over again how I was doing this.

There are some feelings that all the world's pain cannot dull.

Being my carer was breaking you.
Vomiting from exhaustion days before the pressure sore on my sacrum
Finally saw me admitted to hospital.

I refused to leave that ward until I could walk again and despite the best efforts of doctors
Blinded by dogma and biased thought, I received my diagnosis.

Haematoma. Sciatic notch.
Evacuation by Orthopaedic Consultant Surgeon.

As they wheeled me into theatre I yelled "Tell E*** I love her!"
Because you're all that mattered.

They almost missed it. A haematoma the size of a fist removed by the hands of the man explaining this.
Holding up a clenched hand to serve as a reference to the size of the problem
The same hand that had removed it in an operation with no guarantee of success.

The rehabilitation began. And so did the process of losing you.

Nerve blockers, anxiolytics and opiates fuck with your head and I wanted rid of them.

My sex drive was shot and your insecurity mounted in spite of my attempts at reassurance.

It took a further year before we parted and in that time we had good times and bad
But we never truly re-captured the greatness we once held.

It took a further year before I cried at the loss.
The most singular and profound loss of my life.

You see, I had recovered myself physically to ride bicycles once again.
The same bike you decorated with tinsel to welcome me home from hospital.

I was riding along the B3212 across the highest reaches of Dartmoor.
The same road that featured in the "Hairy Hands" shost story I helped you re-draft
For the school kids you taught with such admirable and characteristic dedication.

Beyond Moretonhampstead lies a long climb, the final serious one
The pain of 30+ miles of intense riding was kicking in.
I was clinging on for dear life as I climbed steeply in the lowest of my twelve gears.

That's when I cried.

For in that moment, when the pain got loud and my ego forgot itself,
That's when I heard myself counting.

In for four.
Out for seven.

I love you.