Ghosts

by Dolly Alderton

Mortifying oddity + time = riveting eccentricity.

I cut my legs to ribbons with a disposable razor over the sink because I’d forgotten to shave them in the shower.

‘It is our imagination that is responsible for love, not the other person’

The absence of individualism; the peaceful acquiescence to mundanity.

The sexiest, most exciting, romantic, explosive feeling in the world is a matter of a few centimetres of skin being stroked for the first time in a public place. The first confirmation of desire. The first indication of intimacy. You only get that feeling with a person once.

Why was a sprinkling of the patriarchy so good when it came to dating? I resented it. It was like good sea salt – just a tiny dash could really bring out the flavour of the date and it was so often delectable.

Men always have to keep a low flame burning for every ex. It will be flickering in there for him, even if he doesn’t know it is. Whereas women always have to extinguish it.’

In the long two-day sit-in in our flat that was our eventual break-up conversation, Joe and I did a full enquiry into where the sex went to. I don’t think it’s that we stopped finding each other attractive, I think we stopped seeing each other as gateways to a place of excitement or stimulation. We became each other’s portal to comfort, familiarity and security, and nothing else. For years, the person I wanted to have new experiences with, stay up with, discover things with, was Joe. Incrementally that changed, and he was no longer the person with whom I wanted to live life. He was the person I wanted to report back to as we ate Thai takeaway. I wanted him to be the post-match commentary, rather than the main event. I wanted him to be the photo frame, rather than the photo. And that was when we stopped having sex.

‘When will this all end? I just want someone nice to go to the cinema with.’

balletic

‘I’m fiscally conservative but socially liberal,’ he said within the first two minutes of me asking him about his job. I wouldn’t be surprised if right-leaning thirty-somethings received a script in the post to prepare them for social situations. ‘I’m not sure if I believe that really exists,’ I replied. ‘I know what you’re trying to say. But “I love the gays but don’t care about the poor” can’t be described as liberal in any sense.’

She was so desperate to love someone. It seemed like such a simple, singular thing to ask from this life.