In the morning, I spent some time moving from room to room, soaking up the memories contained within the walls that housed me for nearly two years. I was entirely in the nude. Not for any weird, ritualistic reason. I was about to have a shower, yet before the beads of water soaked my skin, I gravitated to the middle bedroom. Not much happened in the middle bedroom. There were two bookshelves belonging to me in there, and then most of my ex’s clothes, strewn all over the floor and flowing from boxes and bags like puke. The only thing of merit I remember occurring in this room is an afternoon spent reading a book called the pigeon. It was about a man’s fear of a pigeon outside the front door of his apartment and how it shaped his subsequent day. It was by the same author who wrote perfume–the one about the guy who had a fantastic sense of smell and killed women to obtain their scent so he could create the ultimate perfume. When I finished reading the book about the pigeon, I sprawled on the floor like a child throwing a tantrum. My ex was in her gaming room. There was no chance of her disturbing me. She was too engrossed in Tik Tok to care about what I was up to. Dozing on an old duvet, the sun shining through the window was blinding, and as there were no curtains, I buried myself in the soft bedding like a hamster. It was humid, and although mildly unpleasant, it wasn’t enough to deter me from masturbating. I can’t remember what brought me to the brink, but when I reached it, the image of a pigeon on the balcony of my old art school exploded in my mind. It was furiously flapping its wings while its beady eyes bore right through me, and as the orgasm sent bolts of electricity surging through my trembling limbs, in a single gasping breath, I leapt into the air, ready to fly over the rooftops of endless buildings caked in a layer of sparkling snow.

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