Remember December. Your birthday and the sound that rain made as it slapped so hard in fat, dusty drops across the windscreen on our way up the coast. And on the freeway as it came down harder and the wipers, on full blast, failed to keep up. Thwap, thwap, thwap. And you with your window down and your arm soaked, smoking a cigarette ' the watery ash trailing across your window in dotted horizontal lines.

Remember the smell of that summer rain, filling the car and washing us with a feeling of happiness and comfort. There were no cars on the road that day. Just you and I in that vessel.

Remember the taste of the air in our nostrils and on our tongues when, after driving for an hour, the clouds parted without warning and shards of blue sky cut through, the sun making mirrors of the puddles on the side of the road. You said how amazing the world was in the first minute of sunshine after rain.

And we drove with the sun sinking over our noses and the sky slowly processing the shades of pink and yellow. Remember how it almost looked green in parts that night.

And we spent most of that weekend, you and I, side by side on beach towels laid out on the back lawn of your Aunt's house, that grass so fluorescent green and scratchy on our naked torsos, staring upwards at the sky, shielding ourselves from that hot sun with an arm bent across our foreheads. Those trees tall around us bent; buckled like old wounded soldiers. It was so hot then and all above us, the birds beeped like telephones.

We could have been anywhere then, you and me. We could've been on an island staring up at that same sun so ferocious on our pasty city flesh, hot orange sand burning into our feet.

Nothing mattered to us on that day and the days after as we watched the clouds move like lethargic traffic across that blue canvas and again at night after dinner, spotting falling stars and satellites in that sky of shining, silver dots. And as the night pulled us in, you got cold ' tiny goosebumps breaking out on those arms that I loved so much and I pulled you in, our bodies warmer together and we stayed like that until it was nearly midnight, the wind blowing so softly through the trees and that Owl, you remember that Owl, its hoots filled with lust and longing that neither you nor I could begin to understand.

And you asked me to tell you a story and I told you one about a fisherman. About a man teaching his Grandson the skills of his craft. About two men, split by generations but bound by blood standing on the banks of a muddy river relocating fat and smelly carp into a blue bucket by their feet until the bucket was full, each fish flapping madly and lost, gasping for breaths of air, and the boy, smiling broadly, threw his arms around his Grandfather's neck and kissed him on his whiskered cheek. I told you how the boy grabbed the bucket by its wire handle and started for the car and how the old man stopped him, placed his arm on the little boys shoulder and said 'No son, these fish aren't for eating. It's not our place to change the ways of the world, just to observe it, to enjoy it, but to always respect it. And besides, these fish taste like shit"

And how the man took the bucket from the boy's hand and, walking to the water, poured the fish back into the river, each of them scrambling blindly for that cool liquid on their gills.

You listened so intently and I never told you that the little boy was me because it didn't seem important.

And later that night after tiredness had settled in, forcing your eyes periodically to creep shut, we moved inside the house with its 70s décor and sticky linoleum ocean smell and had sex across the back of the couch, your sarong shifted up your back and the palms of my hands sweaty and hot on your skin. You were so tired you could barely stay awake.

I bet if you tried you could remember the next morning and the way how that sliver of warm light shot a triangle across both our faces, caressing us gently out of sleep and into the new day and how you moaned so contentedly, rolling onto your side and pushing your back into my stomach like a spoon. And how you stood by the window in your underwear and drew the curtain and said 'I wish all days could be as beautifully perfect as this' and I sighed 'Yes'.

I boiled the kettle and made us each a cup of coffee and we sat in our underwear on the edge of that bed, sipping it and staring straight ahead until I said something simple like 'Ok, we should go' and you got defensive and snapped back 'Don't be so fucking bossy. You're always bossing me around'.

I wasn't Fiona.

And I said nothing but stared at you wondering at first if you were joking and then, realizing you weren't, thinking how I hardly knew you at all. I said 'I'm not bossing you babe, I just think we probably should get going' and you waved me away with your hand and said something like 'Well go and pack the fucking car or something' and I wondered what demons had settled in while I was away in the kitchen making the coffee. What bad memory had reappeared and looped in that moment to make your mood change so quickly ' to put that great distance between us like strangers. It can't have been something I said as I said nothing. But something. Something in those short minutes when you had been left alone with your head full of thoughts.

And for an hour and a half we drove in complete silence ' you, staring forward out the passenger window with your hand on your chin. Me, behind my sunglasses staring straight ahead and chain smoking.