I’m bored by most things, but not everything. Before work last week, in the smoking shelter at a quarter to five in the morning, I spied a tiny mouse trying to eat a Pringle. The Pringle was twice its size. No one else was there. It was just me, the mouse and the Pringle. And the cigarette dangling from my fingers enveloping me in smoke. It was raining. Not much. Just a drizzle. There was wind, but I couldn’t see it. My favourite thing in life, other than observing the lives of others, is to sleep. It’s a pity I don’t do enough of it. Early starts snatch away so many of my dreams. But I do enjoy the darkness of my morning walks and spotting rodents going about their rodent lives. The lack of human activity, too, is a blessing, although I am a human also, and this shames me greatly. Sometimes, I pretend that I’m not. I pretend I’m merely a memory, floating in the cold breeze blowing down Luton streets, long gone before daylight. At times, on certain spots, my soul escapes its cage, and just for a moment, I am free. It never lasts long, as not much ever does. Still, such passing feelings are what I live for, like that part of a song that causes the hairs on the back of your neck to stand on end, forcing you to listen to it on repeat in the hope it helps you make sense of your life when really our lives are a senseless mess of emotions seconds away from rendering us a blubbering mess.

X and I: A Novel and A Journal for Damned Lovers on Amazon UK

X and I: A Novel and A Journal for Damned Lovers on Amazon US