1;
i'm not a thief, but i kept your favourite baby blue scarf in the second drawer of my bedside table. it still has that hole near the bottom when you frantically tore on your scarf because it started snowing and you wanted to go out and play.

2;
do you remember that night? i do. flakes of snow were floating into place like a crown upon your hair. i told you the heavens were filled with envy after we made snow angels, and you just smiled. and even through all that thick snow our hands met and a warmness no fireplace could beat filled my insides. it felt like home.

3;
lots of things felt like home. i could look into your eyes and know i lived in each galaxy they held. i could bury my nose into every sweater you have ever worn and name all the cookies they smelt of. i could hide under your sheets and in your arms like a childhood game with the couch, only i didn't need to have rules or a time out; time was a fragment of an unneeded past with you. a needed future.

4;
now this time the past is needed. regrets cramp my chest and texts you'll never read sit weighing with glue on my phone. it still has the case you brought me of the cat with yarn. i hope you can see it on the table as you set your cup of tea down. set your head down. the scream of silence fills every corner of the room.

5;
a few sips left. time is catching up and sneaking out from under the table, disobeying the game's rules. it is swallowing up the tea for you too quick and i wish my mind could keep up. words are clogging up my throat like a drainpipe refusing to spill.

6;
i want you to spill your tea over. apologise endlessly like you do. i'll clean it up and buy us more time. but the coins are scattered and few in my pockets and weigh a ton each for all the plans they can't take. please say something.

7;
say something, i used to say, urging to hear beautiful french words come from your lips. you'd giggle and push me flustered into the couch with your striped maroon socks. i wonder if you're wearing them right now. i wonder if you're wearing a smile too worn and frayed to button up all the things left to say right now.

8;
your tea is gone. there is nothing left to say. i wish there was; some dramatic realisation of a way to make things work again, because they cannot, and we know that. and the front door is getting closer and goodbyes are being said and i am getting desperate. tell me there is another feeling, something else. i want to unlearn knowing all has been done. i want to forget to remember. i want your car to break down as soon as you start it.

9;
because i know our mixtape will begin when your drive, but it's okay because i have another copy right here, above the radio. stay. let's listen to it. stay. please, at least one last kiss. stay. i need you. stay. we will miss out on things time set up for us. stay. i know snow angels aren't meant to last but all this time we were sunshine on backyard swings and you were my home. i still call you my home. i still call you.

10;
because without you i am homeless. i need a place to stay.

so stay.