I Hope You Remember What It Was Like To Love Me

I hope you remember what it was like to love me.

I hope you can remember the first time we kissed like we were sixteen again- beer on our breath and a fumbling awkwardness which made our hearts hammer inside our chests. I hope you remember the way I leaned into your body in the kitchen of the house you shared with three other guys but that night it was crammed with hundreds of bodies waiting for midnight to strike, I hope you remember how they seemed to just fall away from us, how it seemed as if our lips touching was all that mattered.

I hope you remember that first night we sat across from each other, three unlit candles in the center of the table because your nervousness made you forget matches. I hope you remember the way I couldn’t seem to talk and breathe and eat with you looking at me like that as if every word which left my lips was the most poetic, entrancing thing you had ever heard. I hope you remember the way my awkwardness seemed to slip away so easily and 4am rolled around as if in seconds, the two of us entwined, talking about the things which haunted us or excited us or made us feel alive. I hope you remember how alive you felt in that moment, I hope even now you hold on to that feeling, I hope it lives on in you.

I hope you remember the weeks which dissolved into years, how it felt as if we had always lived in that too-big house in a too-adult neighborhood. I hope you still see me there, sat on the worktop whilst you cooked the pasta sauce which made me forget the most awful days at work. I hope even now your mind drifts to those conversations we had, to the laughter which bounced off the walls around us. I hope you remember how your arms around me was all it took to wipe the frown lines from my face, how the words you spoke always seemed to settle the crashing of my thoughts, how no matter what, we just understood each other, even if we didn’t always agree.

I hope you remember that my favorite place was the beach, I hope when you find yourself there, the scent of the ocean breeze and the whisper of the waves pull you back to me. I hope you drift away to moments by the shore, my legs over your lap, my fingers in your hair, our conversations darting from profound to complete silliness. I hope you remember my bare feet submerged in sand, my arms thrown wide to the sky and my hair tangled and wild. I hope you think of my skin, freckled and golden and speckled with sand. I hope you ache to touch it, to just hold me.

I hope you remember the way my body felt against yours, pressed up against your back, even in the heat of summer. I hope you remember that I couldn’t sleep unless I had been nestled against you for at least an hour. I hope you feel the weight of my emptiness beside you, I hope my scent still lingers on the pillow, I hope sometimes the darkness feels too vast and too lonely without me. I hope you reach out to pull me into you and your heart drops against the cold of the sheets.

I hope you remember the way I lost myself to books, to fictional worlds. How I would cry over the loss of fictional people and rant for days when a story didn’t go the way I wanted. I hope my corner of the sofa is still mine, I hope she doesn’t sit there like I used to, curled up with a pillow on my lap, I hope you don’t bring her tea and coffee just because it soothes her. I hope you remember that has something which belonged to us.

I hope you remember the way I made you laugh, how you clutched at your stomach and tears rolled down your face. I hope you remember all the times you lost your breath because we managed to laugh at even the difficult moments. I hope you remember the look you reserved only for me, as if I was the only girl in the room, in the world, the only girl who existed for you. I hope that look got lost with me, I hope it’s still mine. I hope you remember how your fear of vulnerability just seemed to disappear when I came along. I hope you remember the things we would whisper in the dark, our fingers interlocked.

Sweet boy, I hope you remember it all because I do.