I need to get this out of my system

I broke up with The Pirate. Yes, me! I did the breaking up. Didn’t see that coming, didya…?

Well. I say I broke up with him. I rang him to talk about ‘us’ on Sunday night and he didn’t answer – must have been feeling extra-specially in tune with the universe and knew not to take that call – and it was the straw that broke this grumpy bitch camel’s back.

I wrote him an email telling him how his behaviour makes me feel and what I want from a relationship. I told him that it’s been 6 months and we’re no closer to any kind of commitment than on day one. He can’t give me what I want, I don’t want this any more regardless of how intoxicatingly delicious he smells, and it’s over.

Whether he’s actually read my email, I do not know. It’s entirely possible that he still thinks I’m his go-to booty call. Oh well.

It was the right thing. It IS the right thing. But it is taking all of my willpower not to ring him up and:

a) Shout at him for  ignoring me while I’m walking out of his life.
b) Cry and ask him why I wasn’t enough for him. What I did wrong. What it is about me that isn’t actually that loveable.
c) Just find out how he is. He’s quite depressed right now. I worry about him.

And I can’t stop crying and all I can think about are the good times. Happily there weren’t that many, it isn’t going to occupy me for very long, but oh. At his best, that man was fucking splendid.

I see myself naked in a hotel room, sitting between his legs facing away from him, and leaning against his chest. Not leaning, actually. His left arm is holding me tight against him in a vice grip, his thighs gripping me in place. I can’t move an inch. He is so, so strong. And he’s touching me with his free hand, fingering me, playing with me, and it feels so good that I arch my back – no. I can’t move. He won’t let me. He pulls me tighter against him and whispers in my ear: ‘Come. Come for me, now. That’s it. Good girl. Good girl…’

It’s the ‘good girl’ bit that gets me. Out of context, a little bit Lassie. In context, my god. So fucking sexy. And not the kind of thing you can ask future lovers to replicate, really. Kinda has to come naturally, otherwise it’s a bit Barbara Woodhouse.

I’m in his living room. It’s late, and we’re with two of his friends. They’re all drunk, I’m not. The Pirate unlocks his rifle and gets it out (licensed and unloaded – he hunts) – I can’t remember why. I’ve never seen a gun before, and ask to hold it. It’s heavy, really heavy, and really beautiful. Ornate engraving. I run my fingers over it, feel the weight in my hands, look through the sights. The Pirate sits opposite me in a swiveling egg chair. He’s slouched low in the chair, legs wide apart, swinging the chair from side to side. He watches me with the gun, and his eyes are narrowed, predatory, appraising, and totally fixed on me. I’m holding a deadly weapon but feel as vulnerable as a kitten.

I come down to the bar to meet him for dinner, and he’s not there. I ask the barman where my gentleman friend has gone. ‘Outside, for a cigarette.’ The Pirate, who only smokes when drunk, is supposed to be quitting. I go out to find him, mock-cross. I find that he isn’t smoking at all. He’s picking me a small bunch of lavender from the garden. I have an ear of it still tucked on my pinboard, behind the bar bill from another debauched night in which we drank our way through the debt of a small country.

The night my dad died, on my doorstep, massive bouquet of sunflowers, bottle of wine, bag full of comfort food.

In the car park of a restaurant we went to a couple of times, the morning after the night before. I drop him off to pick up his van and drive off, looking back to see an expression of such unguarded tenderness on his face. That was the last time I saw him.

I could write down all the bad bits – more than I have already – and they definitely, positively outweigh the good. But my god, he was magnificent. I call him The Pirate but in my head he’s a stag. A glorious, wild, noble, untameable creature.

He doesn’t think he’s magnificent. He hates himself. He can’t see what I do. Did. More testosterone per inch than should strictly be legal and not a bit macho. Funny. Incredibly charming. Intelligent. Self-deprecating. So very, very handsome. And a unique smell all of his own. Raspberry and Rosemary. My Pirate. RIP.