October and us

This time of year reminds me of you.

It reminds me of what we had in another October.

You are the frosty mornings and high blue skies, the musty earthy smell of wet leaves and mushrooms. The warmth of eggs collected from the hens and steaming cups of tea with breakfast.

Together we were the heat of the bed and the icy air outside the duvet. Ours was an autumnal relationship, born out of a dying summer flirtation.

There were the raucous nights in the village pub. How you stole the show, my beautiful boy, had them hanging on your every word. But the nights that finished with us tumbling into bed and those that were spent by a smoky fire drinking Merlot couldn’t make this any more permanent.

You once told me if I wanted to understand you I should read the House of God by Samuel Shem. I read it twice, desperately searching for a meaning. In my heart of hearts, I knew there was none to be had.

So I will always remember us on beechnut-covered ground, clothes torn roughly aside while a lazy hunter’s moon hung low in the sky, and the frost crept up from the ground and down through the branches. The quiet depths of the wood disturbed by quickened pulses and cold air in our lungs.

We had some times didn’t we?