So how do I slow down from here?

All the creatures living in my head stood still that day, standing sentinenel, guarding parts of myself I didn't even know needed protection. Keeping my heart from shattering into a thousand tiny pieces, I guess. Not that it seems to be a problem. I think you took my heart with you.

I got the call on a tuesday. It was raining outside, I was standing in our kitchen, about to make us tea for when you got home. I remember it quite clearly. Remember the phone ringing. I thought it was you so I answered with a funny accent. I remember sinking down to the floor, leaning against the cupboard doors, speechless. I remember assuring the gentleman on the other end that it was all well, that I would be around in an hour. Where was the address again? Oh, that's right, I know. I've passed there before.

I never was a good liar. They knew. Each and every one of the staff knew. I busied myself with reading and re-reading the forms that I couldn't tell you a world of now. I made feeble jokes with the lady in the waiting room. I inspected the ceiling, read every page of each magazine on the IKEA coffee table, picked at my nails. I asked for another half an hour, I just wanted to finish reading this article. I just couldn't face reality.

Not without you.

And when I finally walked through our front door, the house was silent, as if everything in it knew you were gone.

Your ghost was here last week. I could feel you standing behind me as I sat, restless and alone on the floor in front of the couch. We never really sat on the couch. I think they were more for show, to try and convince visitors that we were actually normal people. I don't think it ever really worked.

We used to go to IKEA and play hide and seek. I would be breathless with laughter, collapsed on some part of their swedish furniture while you would act sensible when staff came over to offer unwarranted assistance. You would start up a conversation while I attempted to inhale my laughter to a point where I was sure it was bad for me. I'd walk over to you, and you'd look sideways at me, eyes wild, and raise your eyebrows in acknowledgement. We could have an unspoken conversation, understanding everything that was going through both of our minds while you seamlessly, effortlessly continued your conversation.

I don't go there anymore. I don't think I can. I see you too much there.
'Am I a terrible person?' I asked your mother. We call eachother almost everyday, but rarely say anything.
'You miss him, don't you?' She asked in response.
Silent filled the air, thick and unpenetrable. Even our conversation was bare without you in it.

I almost threw everything out last monday. A new start, I said. I'll move across the city, across the country, across the world. I resolved to go to the travel agents to book tickets, but didn't get as far as the pavement.
'It's not that I can't leave this town, It's just that... I don't need to.' I said, to nobody in particular.

'Last week I went to the store everyday.' I said to your sister. 'Is that weird? I'd go there with a list of things, but just end up going through each aisle looking at the different packaging, and leave with only a bag of carrots.'
We'd sit at the rickety table in her kitchen, looking everywhere but at each other, while not drinking the tea in front of us.
'It's so hot!', we'd exclaim, both conscious of the fact that neither had finished a cup since last April.
I picked at the tablecloth with burn marks all over it.
'I tried to take up smoking again.' She mumbled, 'You know, to help with the stress.'
I nodded, not really knowing what I was agreeing to.
'I just can't hold onto a ciggarette. My hands shake and I drop them, each time. I can't do it in public, and so I keep burning the table in here.'
'So that's why you put the cloth on?'
'Yes. But I kept trying. I thought if I kept trying I wouldn't drop them.'

I think we just needed someone through which to hold onto you.

I had a dream about our children last night. You were there. We had decided that life was not enough for us, so we turned a red double decker bus into our new house and travelled around the country with an old grandfather clock, playing music and dancing underneath the stars, cooking food out of fires in barrels. I was pregnant, and our son would be born with blonde hair, even though both yours and mine is brown.

I woke up gasping. My lungs were cold. Even after that, I was still too numb to cry.

You were just too good, too wholesome.
'People can't live like that all the time', your mother said to me on Thursday. 'The angels get restless, people aren't supposed to be that good.'
'I haven't cried yet.' I admitted, 'Is that normal?'
'Were you ever normal?' She replied.
I bit my lip, stirring more honey into the cup of tea I would never finish.
'It will come. One day it will hit you, and you won't be able to breathe, and then you won't be able to stop. Sometimes it just takes time'

Time. With you time stood still. Now anything faster than that is almost unbearable.

And all I want is it to stop.

So how do I slow down from here?