Heart the Lover

by Lily King

He goes to the kitchen and I have a cry in the bathroom. I want to tell him how I’m feeling, ask him if he noticed that we haven’t seen each other since last Friday. This is what my old boyfriend Jay meant when he said I bottled things up. But I’m not good at saying that I feel hurt or forgotten or rejected. There had been no room for that growing up. I’m more skilled at burying those emotions.

‘Isn’t love a form of hope?’ I said. ‘No. Love is crushing. Love is something you let yourself feel at your own peril, despite your better sense.’

‘You know how you can remember exactly when and where you read certain books? A great novel, a truly great one, not only captures a particular fictional experience, it alters and intensifies the way you experience your own life while you’re reading it. And it preserves it, like a time capsule.’