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I have an obsession with knowing people's stories. Life stories, love stories, the happenings, the non-happenings, regrets, reflections. All the boys I date go through an ongoing grilling about what they were thinking or wanting at different moments in the initial fireworks stages. What did they think of me during the first conversation, first kiss? What did they want out of the situation? What did they think would happen later? What did they think of my reactions? It's like putting together a puzzle, fitting their reality with mine. Sometimes it doesn't quite fit - 'OMG I can't believe you thought I didn't like you' being one cliche classic - and the final painting ends up, I'd like to think, like a Matisse painting: bright colours, looks kinda like reality with an endearing quirkiness. It's the process that attracts me as well, you learn so much about a person by the hopes they clung to, the assumptions made, signs read or misread. That's why I invariably stay friends with these boys, the debriefing analysing is fascinating. Even when it all goes wrong, several years later you get to sit down and pull the mess apart, untangle, rewind it into a neater ball. Ideally. 

Had the perfect one night stand, by my definition of it at least. He talked to me for hours, was generally very considerate, made me laugh, an impossibly irreverent sense of humour reminding me of of good friends back home. Entirely non-seedy, only slightly alcoholic. It was spontaneous fun. 

But now I have to let it go, every rational part of me knows it. Saw the danger signs, he's likely to get emotional, its just not going to end well from any point further than this. But it's killing me to not know his story. What was he thinking? What had he wanted out of it? At what point did he realise I might be interested? What convinced him to make a move? Why? Is he also going to look back on it and laugh?

The thought of never knowing makes me ache, just a little. Bittersweet, because in a way the uncertain endings are sometimes just how its meant to be, but at the same time it's sad that I'll never get to see the full painting. I'll carry with me half the colours, half the brush strokes, and that will always look lonely.