Inhale the sea

It was yet another uncalculated calculation, to impress her, to win her over – like that’d do either of them any good. He’d offered to run away to the seaside with her, when they both found themselves sinking under the same buoy, thanks to the loves of their respective lives invoking the freedom clauses they’d always insisted upon in bed, around the kitchen table – because what use was a right if it forever remained theoretical? The heart is its own best lifeguard, wasn’t that was the message of St Sebastian’s Day – and didn’t he die because he couldn’t swim on account of the arrow-holes? She scrolled through the ever-lengthening WhatsApp wondering whether she really was going to say what she wanted to but fuck it, a beach and a bedroom in unequal measures was what both of them needed and damn future diagnoses until their arms ached from holding each other. Still, she couldn’t resist one more task for him: Yes I’ll make love to you, but first you have to calm down and inhale the sea.