Flash Fiction #4: Chocolate

I remember a sweetness.

The very first time we did it, on the pile of coats at someone else’s party, you never quite let go of my hand. Somehow I stayed nervous even afterwards, so you kept your hand in mine, reaching with your left first for your cigarettes, then a lighter, then chocolate.

I was young, and so I loved every little weird thing about you. The weirdest, littlest thing being what I loved the most. The way you'd write your name on random objects, claiming ownership. Your finger traces in the dust, sand, steam, seemed almost flirtatious.

Memories are like Polaroids; easily smudged, creased, bereft of prologue or context.  You, giving me a mint in a café by means of a kiss. You, pulling the duvet to your side, telling me to fuck off. You, looking back at me before getting in your battered Mini. The last Polaroid.

Time runs away with itself, and it seems like I never leave this room. I light the occasional cigarette and gorge on sweet things, but it's empty pleasure and if I ever get the urge to phone you, I stop myself because by now it’s years too late.

Instead, I throw away your pictures, and the smokes, and the chocolate.  I try my best to forget every weird little thing about you, but still I remember a sweetness. It sticks, cloying in my mind, an unmoving trace, like a name written on a mirror in lipstick.