I don't know why, I got these feelings, yeah...

Oooh. And suddenly, everything changes. I'm not as in love with R as I was, it's settled, and I need to move away, I need to be independent. I want my own space. I want a minimalist place with Danish colours and my book collection on shelves, a cigarette tray, things I've chosen. I also want a job, a good one. I imagine my perfect life relentlessly. That's not what this is about. I've fallen so easily for a woman I've known ten minutes. HC. She lives in another country. She's a friend of a friend, and she knows about maths. She elucidates in short, simple terms and looks shy, but is fierce. She is kind. She hasn't responded to my facebook request.

She's probably not interested in girls. She probably wouldn't come here. I'm probably simply so desperate for someone that I'm ready to fall for the first person that seems reasonable.

It's just that she's so easy. We went out for the day (and the night) with a group of friends. I went to pick someone up from a station with her, and we danced together at night, and I want her to be here now. I want her to be in this little room, telling me intelligent, true things. I want to tell her true things. Not necessarily intelligent ones, because we are inverse; she's so clever, she doesn't need words with more than three syllables. I adore words with more than three syllables, perhaps to put a superficial shell over the vacuity that is my intelligence.

 I'd tell her that I think she's beautiful. I'd tell her that I want her so badly, and I almost never want people badly straight away like that. I'd tell her that even her middle name's not so bad. I'd tell her that I can think of nothing lovelier than the way she dances and includes people, I would tell her that I was sorry I couldn't stop staring and she caught me twice, but I just thought, 'how can it be that I've fallen this fast?'. I wasn't expecting it. It caught me offguard.

And now. You live far away. You've got a career. Even if you were magically interested in women, and then, even more magically, interested in a woman like me, overly garrulous, with no real handle on the world. No real career, no real anything, and there you are, ready to jet off on a tangent but with your feet on the ground. So there, so present. A present. For me. An unexpected union, because at least we did do things together. I'd have kissed you if you'd seemed as if you wanted me to. It would never have happened.

I'd have... I wished for an act of prestidigitation. Somehow.

 There's never a somehow with me, because I never get what I want. I never want what I get. Those two are very different, but very similar. Yet, still, you explained that 'i' was an illogical number, like pi. You answered. You were so kind to everyone, and not as K is, demanding something in return. Just kind. You danced like I did, you were angry that Liverpool accents weren't taken seriously, you straightened your hair and wore leg warmers. You looked perfect, to me. You're so beautiful, I realised, around two hours in. Your face with its upturned lip over your front teeth, your dark shiny hair, your cheekbones and your blue eyes with hooded lids that look, sage and perceptive, at the world. The way that you laugh. Yes, you are lovely, and you've probably got many others telling you so, so I shouldn't bother.

I have people telling me I'm lovely, even beautiful, but it's nobody that I want to inform me of this fact. Men that want to take me for coffee, for a drink, for an 'intimate soiree', for something. I'm sure that they want something long term that I can't give because I adore people like you. Honest, steadfast people that make me really laugh. I light up for the world, people tell me, but nobody really lights me up. It's rare. It's palindromic, an oxymoron, something. People fall for me, they say, because of my face, my ways, my 'lightness of being'. French women are light of body and heavy of mind, and I'm the exact opposite. Lightness of character, because I weigh over 80 kilos. In any case, I'd give up all of those times, those times that someone has told me I'm beautiful to get something from me that I didn't want to give, a smile, a hand, or something else, to hear it from you. I'd exchange them for insults. I'd...

 That's the thing, though. Attracting someone like you isn't as easy as attracting all of them, which I do inadvertently. I don't mean to. I want to be friends, and then, suddenly, they want more. Now it's me that wants more. It's me that's heavy, that weighs on you, that would force... I don't want to force. I couldn't ever get anyone like you. Someone so beautiful and honest, so funny and kind and clever and steadfast, must want someone steadfast and kind and intelligent. Someone like you doesn't want a silly, overgrown girl, who's vague and silly, who masks a lack of knowledge with an egregious vocabulary and her sheer verbosity, who doesn't earn. Someone like you deserves someone better.

 That doesn't stop me from fantasising about holding your hand or caressing your face. Oh darling.

Whispering, whispering, whispering your name.

Is what I've been doing, thinking of you for two weeks on Parisian streets. Whispering to myself (late at night, when nobody else is in sight) that I adore you, darling, and you're beautiful and I hope you're well.

You're worried about H again. Your back aches. I came up to see you (you made me smile) and drank tea, and what I really wanted to do was just put my arms around you and stroke you. I want to wake up in the morning with the softness of your skin next to me, and caress you. You deserve to be woken up by caresses.

You said you would try to be 'discret' with me and V, in the sense of unobtrusive. Oh darling, please don't. You're still the main person in my life at the moment, so there's no need to be. You're not easily replaced. There's no need. I couldn't say that without it all coming out, so I just said, 'non, pas du tout' and smiled at you.

I thought maybe I'd have knocked this feeling on the head. But I can't, dear. When I saw you again, I just wanted to hold you and touch you and make you feel so good. Maybe tomorrow. I want to lean over and kiss you, I want to tell you how much it means to faire des bisous each night, how much it means to just be chatting to you, calmly and quietly. How much you mean to me. And you mean an awful lot. J'ai soif de toi. That's what I won't tell you tomorrow.

You bring me back cigarettes and a lighter and tell me the things that made you think of me. You thought of me. I think of you, often. I need a way of telling you you're important to me whilst not scaring you with this passion. I am looking out for other people, but the problem is qu'elles n'arrivent pas a ta cheville.

Tomorrow we'll eat together and relax, and I'll smoke (you probably will too) and you'll sort your things and I will offer to massage your back at some point. And I'll recite Les Aveugles for you. Let me let me let me faire ce qui te rends heureuse.

I am grateful for you.

I am missing you. I joked today, to the Supermodel, that I was wearing your clothes because I missed you. I put on your coat because it's nearest to hand and it's got pockets for cigarettes and matches, because it buffets me against the wind, I put on your shoes because they're easiest to slip on- but a part of me does like wrapping myself up in the fabric that held your body, soft and safe. I laughed after I'd told her, but there's an element of truth. Tu me manques.

And I'm grateful because you're there, my love. You're present. You're there to laugh with, to tease gently, to be kind to, to share my worries with, and you, in turn, share yours with me. It's very gentle, what we've got. Very sweet. As soft and gentle as the kiss you give me every morning and night, as soft as your silken face, as soft as the scent of soap that emanates from you. You know what I'm thinking, or more to the point, how I think and don't correct my speech because you understand; you understand my pride and you understand me, without having perfect pronunciation. You're kind. And so I am grateful, for this relationship, which, although not the grande coup de foudre, is a bond. A link for me and for you. Between us.

It's something that E, my sister hasn't got. She hasn't got someone to shout, 'bonjour' to when she comes home, she hasn't got someone to remark on the cold to, she hasn't got someone to discuss the finer points of various sorts of bread with. They're the things that are not important, but open the doors to other things. H's epilepsy. Your husband. How I feel about my family. They're the things that I like talking about, the unimportant things that are nonetheless interesting. They're the things I need in the day. Someone to pass the time of day with. It's lucky that you're also beautiful and interesting and funny, and so loving. It's so unlucky that E hasn't. I wish I could give her a week with your safety, with you being with her as you are with me. Life is about having someone to be with. I'm so glad that I'm with you. It's not romantic, it's not even close. But you do love me, in your way, and I don't think that it will change. Friends, or family. Stable and kind, and soft.

Today: things I'd tell you.

Que ton echarpe m'a garde bien chauffee aujourd'hui, malgre le froid.

Que la lune etait belle au-dessus de nos toits.

Que mon joue est fraiche.

Que j'ai mange tant de choses.

Que la supermodele m'a fait du cous cous. Elle est gentille, mais elle ne serait jamais une personne comme toi; c'est a dire, quelqu'une avec qui j'ai cette relation si tendre et si chaleureuse; cette reconaissance d'esprit. Je n'ai pas pense qu'on aurait trouver ca, en commencant. Tu etais chic et reserve et altiere. Mais maintenant, c'est moi qui chauffe pour toi; c'est toi qui me fait des bises, qui me donne des choses, qui montes toutes les trucs que je te donne a toute le monde.

Et si ta journee ne s'est passe bien, je veux te caresser la visage et te donner un bisou, de te prendre par la main et de te carrer confortable dans mes bras. De te dire que tu es belle, tu es fiere et tu es honnete et gentille et intelligente, et surtout que tu m'es si importante. O, ma cherie. Je veux etre la pour toi, quand tu as besoin.

You've gone away for a few days

With H, who's so needy at the moment. I look back and see that there was once a phase when we didn't kiss every day. It's not a real kiss. Just two, on the cheek, the bisous. But once we didn't. Then, after two months, we started- and now it's odd to have a day when you don't kiss me goodbye in the morning or kiss me goodnight.

What I want is to massage your back again. I don't know whether or not you found it odd, or whether you (like me) think it's something we don't do when there are others around, or whether you think it's putting on me. It's not, in any case.

You've made a rod for your own back
Which has already taken so many lashes
You feel like you have to cook
Because it's what you do
And you try so hard to be serene
But it's all paddling frantically underneath
And my love
I want to take you in my arms
And make you happy
And touch my lips to yours
If it's what you want.
You deserve someone you want
And I'd love it to be me
But I can't see
How I could ever find out
Without ruining what we've got
Four daily kisses
Twilight poetry recited under the stars of Parisian rooftops
And your seldom touch
And eternal companionship.
It's a risk.

This race, and this world...

I showed you that song. I showed you 'this'. You repeated the words after me. I couldn't help but think, when I said, 'this feeling and this girl' of you. You were standing in front of me and it's the closest I'll get to telling you, probably. Because you're not a girl, and I'm just past being one. I came home at eight tonight. I could have stayed where I was longer, but I wanted to talk to you and I wanted to be tired. I would have loved nothing more than to come in and wind myself up in your arms and your soft skin, stroke your hair. Envelop you like a blanket. I was cold and tired, and I wanted you. I couldn't have you in my arms, so I basked in your smile instead and smoked with you and taught you, seeing the words I say interpreted in your mouth.

I said you were 'touchante, engageante,attachante' when you lisp in English. You're lovely. You said, 'et on fait des bisous' and we did tonight, one on each cheek. Why, I wonder? Why some nights? I will have to do this more for you. Do you know you're beautiful? Probably not. Maybe you think you were, a while ago. You sometimes say, 'ca ne me fait pas trop jeune fille?' when you wear a dress, and you let slip the odd thing. I tell you there are lots of fish in the sea. I don't tell you that I'd like to be the one you're angling for. I don't say, 'do you know you're lovely, with your gossamer blonde hair and your eyes that light up, so dark and so vivid, and your soft skin that's so smooth and so warm, and your straight teeth and your mouth when you laugh with your lips so finely and sensibly cut, so French? Do you know your cheekbones and your skinny arms and legs make me worried, that I yearn to stroke your little stomach, especially when you admonish yourself for it, and that you're undeniably chic, and that the way you move, graceful and bouncing, is so endearing?'. I don't say those things. I smile. I quote poetry and songs. Those are ways of saying what I mean. Et sangloter d'extase les jets d'eau, les grands jets d'eau sveltes parmi les marbres. That's how I feel for you. I'm sobbing for joy (though I never say that and wouldn't want to, it's far too pretentious), energy amid something classic and strong. That's what I feel. You say I've given you a new taste for Verlaine. I want to give you English poetry. I want to give you poetry about beautiful women, not arrogant, condescending mockery designed to get women into bed (like the first poem I learned- why did you choose that one, why? Accroupie is so harsh). I want to give you something to show you how beautiful you are, darling.

Elle me dit

Que je suis belle avec mes taches de rousseur. I can't work out whether she likes me around or whether she thinks I should get a life because twenty five year olds don't hang about with sixty eight year olds. But I want to hang about with her. Today I could have gone out earlier, I could have seen people- but I didn't want to, because she's the most interesting. I come home for lunch because I like talking to her, I go out with her because she's interesting to see things with, I don't know whether she feels like it's too much. I hope not. She mentioned that A seemed to be here all the time and always returned- I hope she doesn't think I'm like that too. I don't want to be cloying.

I think that she might want someone to care for. She worries about A because he doesn't like the food here, because he doesn't want to absorb Paris. And she likes helping people absorb things, maybe too forcefully- she can't accept that there are other ways of doing things. She wants to be the best at the alliance, and she worries. And I worry too. I worry about her coming back at the usual time that she comes back and waking her when I'm loud and clattery and whether she's OK if I hear banging in one of the houses joined to us, and whether she's alright on the tube. Though she always is. I worry because I like her. And she said she worried about me, when I didn't come home until really late one night- she worried. I thought that was lovely.

Today, she rolled my hair into a chignon and said, 'tell me if it hurts' when she put in the open-ended grips. It didn't because she's very gentle. She showed me her powder and brushed it onto my face and smiled. She's so willing to share things, her coat, her shoes... and I don't find it irritating because she's kind and French and a bit of a know it all, but lovely with it. It's odd, not to find this brand of care irritating- but I don't, yet. I don't know whether she thinks of me as a gangling sort of person that needs a helping hand, or a replacement for her daughters, or a living doll that it's interesting to be around, or someone she can mould, or someone she can be kind to. Or all of those things.

She's so brave and so easily hurt. She goes to teach in a place for teens with problems, and a girl had a hard time the other day- and R felt bad about it, I knew, because she mentioned it three times. Partly because she was worried about the girl, and partly because of the language she used. She didn't go into detail, she simply said that it was 'grossier'. And oh, how I wanted to take her in my arms and tell her she was strong and brave, and for that so sensitive... and that I wanted desperately to protect her from these things, even though she's independent and lives and wants to do them. Not protect, I don't want her to stop doing what she likes, I just want to give her a safe place, to comfort her when things aren't what she wants them to be. And she's fun. She runs round museums with me and makes me laugh and wonders at the displays that are like fireworks and says, 'it makes me sad because I know it'll soon be gone'. In France, I feel like people are always saying small things that give away their personalities. She fears things going, and braves it all the same. She told me I could go if I ever found something that suited me more, and I said thanks, and that she could tell me to go if she needed her own space back- because maybe she does need it back sometimes. She doesn't mention her husband. Her children come, sometimes- less often than she'd like. She was sad when her first daughter left home.

We've started to have habits together. At least, they've become habits for me. I go to her room and watch TV, she comments along in French and asks if I understand. She cooks, with my help, and I help her wash up. We go shopping and I take the bags. If one of us eats an apple, we usually offer the other person the other half. The same applies to chocolate and cake, and anything we cook. We sit in the kitchen and eat. We laugh about my habit of eating a ridiculous amount of cake and analyse A's behaviour. She puts my hair in a chignon, when I ask. We drink tea in the evening and usually smoke a cigarette together at least once a day. We don't speak on the tube; we read companiably. I recite poetry, she corrects, I repeat the corrections. When we're especially pleased with each other, we give each other a peck on the cheek. I did this the other day before departing for school, and she said, 'ah, tu es gentille'. I've got a friend that lost her hair, and she'd just spoken about losing her hair once, and how people think it's something else and how the back of her head looks like a pig's skin (it doesn't. But I wouldn't care if it did). We begin to call each other, in the style of Sherlock Holmes, 'ma chere', before each of our names. We do this in a Sherlock-Holmes tone, but I am meaning it differently. And she'll never know. But at least she's got someone who's appreciating her, albeit furtively, and expressing it without romance.