And on days where it feels as if there is very little to live for, just looking at him still reminds me that there is something so good in the world. A climate crisis brings daily anxiety, the newspapers are littered with transphobia, the government goes beyond incompetence to arrive somewhere between casual cruelty and calculated fascism. Something – perhaps the only thing, except that blondes really do have more fun – I feel sure of. We decided there and then, on the A419 on the way to celebrate the choices of some dear friends who had done what they were supposed to do and moved to the countryside to raise their perfect child, that this open thing was a terrible idea. We could not seem to find the right song to narrate the moment, for the whole 90-minute trip, until I burst and said: “OK, we fucked!” The atmosphere in the car as we drove out of London was one of deep, icy tension. The day after I’d consummated our open relationship, we packed a bag and drove to the countryside for a friend’s baby’s christening. And annexing this desire is perfectly fine, but when you simply ask the question, “But why?”, finding a solid answer becomes difficult. It’s been this way for aeons and it will be this way for aeons to come (or until the next pesky mass extinction event hits). I don’t know a single person in a monogamous relationship who doesn’t flirt, have crushes, perhaps overstep the mark in someone’s DMs. It was simply annexed in our brain, right there next to Catholicism and the bad exes. See, the thing about our monogamous relationship was that the desire we had for others never went away. A monogamy which, until then, I’d held on to so tightly it was as likely to suffocate me, or my partner, as the worrisome potential of finding someone better. But also, perhaps, like I was beginning to undo three decades of conditioning towards monogamy. When I arrived home that night after sleeping with the first person who wasn’t my boyfriend in seven years, I felt, simply, glad to climb into bed next to him. The rush of the new spills over into my primary partnership Kissing was, bizarrely, harder than anything else because a kiss with a stranger these days feels more intimate, and until then that intimacy had been reserved only for my partner. The date was fun, the sex was wild – not better or worse, but invigorating in its difference. I kissed my partner and my dog, Celine Dion, goodbye.
What on earth do you talk about? I messaged a friend who is a very chic dater: “Just ask him his most problematic opinion… Honestly, it’s the best opener.” I wore black, because I always wear black, and I unbuttoned my shirt one lower than usual.
It was the first date I’d been on in way over half a decade. My partner and I discussed it: “Let’s just see what happens.” He flirted so hard it was essentially impossible to say no. It was with an incredibly hot guy who I’d met at a fashion party, because I’m glamorous like that. The first date with someone else was mine.