i. there is old blood crusting under your nails like rusting metal and you don't know if it is yours or someone else's but he looks at you like you are something holy and you forget about the sins crawling in your bones.

ii. he finds you in an overflowing bathtub - head between your knees, nails carving ****** moons into your skin; later you tell him yes, sometimes shower water against porcelain sounds like gunshots raining on your skin.

iii. your name is a whispered prayer that spills from his mouth and he repeats it over and over like a mantra; he breathes words you recognise from a dream and they condense in the frosty air between his lips and yours.

iv. he tells you that your bruises look like galaxies and holds you like the world has cheated him of you for far too long. tonight, you run out of names before he runs out of kisses.

v. hazy-gold sunlight sieves through the moth-eaten curtains and frames his face and you can't stop holding his cheeks in your palms because he is here, he is here, he is here, and you've long grown tired of wondering why he hasn't left yet.