5:21 PM

exploring with you

We left the coffee shop a few hours after meeting there. I decided to show the touristy places first, get the chaos over and done with.

It was a nice day, the sun was shining and a warm breeze blew across the city. You took the sunglasses from the top your head and put them on, of course they suited you, to be fair though you could make an Aldi bin liner look like Versace. It was a talent of yours.

The sun gleamed in my eyes and I cursed the fact that I had my glasses on. I was pretty sure they were only magnifying the suns rays. You giggled at my discontent, and called me an idiot. That brought a goofy smile to my face, your laugh could make the cruelest of people feel kind.

I took you to the cathedral first. It was a magnificent building, the stone walls adorned with grotesque gargoyles. The inside mimicked that of a Spanish cathedral, biblical paintings on all the walls, the colour gold everywhere. Stained glass windows speckled the walls of the cathedral, illuminating the floor in a plethora of colours; lilacs, indigos, roses and corals. The way the light danced around you made you look iridescent, angelic.

The smell of burnt sage, wafted towards us and made me gag internally. I always hated the smell of sage, it reminded me of the mould that grows upon bread. You didn't seem to mind it though. You told me that you had smelt worse things in life and this was relatively decent.

The masses of paintings caught your eye, they were inspirations for literature. You told me how you would interpret the message, without the use of the Bible, and how you would translate that onto a blank piece of paper.

'You see this part, the demonic claws parting the earth with fire, I would write about how prejudicial attitudes  and intolerance are parting our world, dividing it. Creating hate and horror.'

You had an extreme dislike for inequality and the harsh treatment of certain minorities. It made your blood boil and your heart pound with hatred.

We spent a good hour wandering around the cathedral, chatting about the art, the colours and the smells. Then you told me that you wanted to see the best park there was, you wanted to breathe in the honeysuckle that was laced in the air.

So I took you to Regent Park, the prettiest one in the city. The grass was always well kept, trimmed to an inch and a half. It was soft grass too, not the harsh dry grass that pricks your skin leaving you with a nasty red rash, but the lush type that feels like lying on a cloud.

The wildlife was immense here, so many species living in a two mile radius. You told me that they all seemed to get along, and that the only fight was over food. I agreed, not really knowing what to say as I just specialised in Middle Earth wildlife. That was the problem of being immersed into literature, reality seems fake and wrong.

I sat down on the grass, under the shade of a large willow tree. I did not want to be squinting to see your face as I talked to you, I wanted to take all your beauty in properly. You laid on your stomach, your hands propping your chin up as you closed your eyes and listened to the soft lull of nature.

'I feel so calm,' you told me.

'This place is pretty cool, and it never really gets that busy as there is only a swing and slide for kids,' I explained softly.

You opened your eyes. The sun brought out the specks of honey in them, making your eyes a whirlpool of colour and emotion.

'I just feel so inspired here, I feel I could write and write without ever getting bored,'

'When life gets too much you know, I sometimes come here to paint and draw. We could be anywhere here, the tranquility destroys the hustle and bustle of the city,' I told you.

'Well with the sun shining on me, I could be in Italy right now,'

You were right, of course. The high temperatures and warm wind created a Mediterranean climate.

We stayed there, you in the sun, me in the shade, for a while. Soaking up the warmth. I wanted to take you to the gallery but it was closed for some unknown reason, so instead I took you to the library.

It was a grand Edwardian building. Large sash windows embellished the ivory white walls. Inside the library, light trickled through the window, the dust shimmering softly reflecting and illuminating the suns rays.

The musty smell of ancient books enveloped us, it smelt of knowledge and emotion. It was a maze, navigating your way through the labyrinth of books was hard, but you did it with ease. It was natural for you.

You skipped down the aisles, stopping every so often to flick to a random page of a book you picked off the shelf. Then you would close the book with a gentle thud and skip off, humming Fur Elise quietly to yourself.

This made me feel warm inside, you were an open book but an enigma, there was method to your madness and you had a clarity like no other. You were tolerant of everyone but idiots, any hate crimes towards minorities made you angry, seething in fact. Anything unjust made you sick and pale with confusion. You were such a pure human being and I was falling in love with that.