Brown Sugar

I am inexplicably, unconditionally, irrevocably in love with him. The way he looks down when he smiles yet the corners of his lips turn up, its manic what he does to me its like death and life combined to form him in the image of their deepest desires in a manifested, physical form.

Walking hand in hand in the rain, as everyone raises hoods or umbrella’s we look at each other and feel the water hit our skin, gentle enough to be thousands of fingertips caressing our arms, face and necks. Staring at him feels sensual, the freedom that having limitations brings is ironic salvation. Only with limits can things outside of it feel freeing and exciting rather than mundanely average. I throw my head back, my hand still clutching another’s warm palm. I feel the rain land against my eye lids and run down my face, as though the gods cry through me – a mere instrument in a lifetime of sophisticated ideals by those more worthy than I. I open my mouth to taste the crisp autumn air as onlookers judge and comment only to go home and gossip of a young pair who were being ever so disruptive to the tranquillity of a busy street.

He grabs my waist, and kisses me roughly, but passionately like my lips was his last breath of oxygen. “God, I love your lips” he gasps with an intensity I had never felt before. To feel wanted, to feel whole in that one sentence that played like a broken record in my head over and over as I became more intoxicated with the words. He kissed me again only this time it felt like world was spinning around us and we were the grounding stillness, like we were the only people on earth, I couldn’t bring myself to pull away so I ran my hand through is blonde hair and closed my eyes once more.

We let our lips part and giggled – still nose to nose. He grabbed my shoulder and we swayed down the street, drunk on love. “i-i think I love you, you know” I muttered anxiously as he smirked to the ground once more. You can’t love a stranger I told myself but maybe someone can only be considered a stranger if they were well, strange. We began walking down to the river. “so, what do you do then?” he said bluntly with an undertone of confidence. “I dunno like jobwise? I’m unemployed, but I’ve got a day worth of training in 50 different fields.”

“Everyone’s unemployed, don’t think your special sweetheart” he looked me up and down “though you don’t look the type to play the field” he smirked. I playfully pushed his shoulder. “Not like that you creep” I said concealing my smile. I felt as light as air with him. We walked down the riverside, by now it was dark with only streetlights to illumine the damp concrete in front of us. We sat on our jackets and looked out across the water. Light reflecting to create a more beautiful version of our surroundings, the wind swayed alongside us making a ripple affect and giving me goosebumps. “it feels strangely calm right now, I mean we barely know each other but I feel I’ve known you forever. I miss this, just stopping time for a while” he smiled with a sense of relief audible in his voice yet continued looking over the water. “You’re pretty cool you know, not like look what I own cool, but just cool – like naturally if that makes sense.” He turned around this time and looked me in the eyes, and I froze straight to my core, his eyes looked black in the warm urban light, his pupils seemed to consume all colour.

I tried to lift my arm to move my hair out of my face and I couldn’t. It was like my whole body was moving in slow motion. I took a deep breath and my chest felt hollow. There wasn’t enough air in the world to fill my lungs. The world began spinning again, but this time I was spinning with it. I felt like I was in a dream – falling back to earth, but I wasn’t scared. I looked around and saw him as my body slammed into the damp concrete we once walked along happy as if the end of the world was a millennium away. But it wasn’t. He swayed over to me and kneeled beside my body. My love I thought – is here to rescue me. “You good? Girl what’s your name” I looked up at him as I began to see the ground approaching in my dream. I looked over to my jacket and it wasn’t there, then to the river which was a nothing more than a mass of water from a flash flood. My head was spinning. “But I love you” I said choking back tears and gasping for breath. “I just met you tonight I shared some brown you looked like you were having a rough night, but I don’t know you. It was probably just the high , the euphoria, you’re just coming down, get over yourself” He dropped my head on the concrete and began to walk away. My veins felt like they were burning when I looked down, I saw the two small holes on my arm. “no no no no no no” I choked wanting to slam the ground with both fists, but my body was turning to stone, I couldn’t move. Tears ran down either side of my face as the lights got dimmer and dimmer. My head fell to the side and I saw his boots walking away. “but I love you” I muttered unable to breathe. My eyes turned black and my body grew cold as my bones broke into a million pieces in my dream. Foam filled my mouth and then nothing, my silhouette lay alone and cold on the ground. Sometimes sweet delights have bitter ends.