You’ll just Know. You’ll see them in everything. Suddenly the sun reflecting off your windshield glows the same way as their smile. The apple you’re about to eat is as pink as their lips that you want to kiss over and over again. The supermarket reminds you of that Sunday morning they tried to make you pancakes and got flour all over the floor. The blanket at the foot of your bed suddenly becomes them when they’re not there, and every single time, it’s not nearly warm enough. Their eyes become galaxies you get lost in. You think they’re the funniest, smartest, most beautiful person you have ever met. They drive you crazy in the best way. The noises they make in their sleep suddenly become the same noises you dream about. They have three separate laughs. One when they are mocking someone, one when someone has made a joke they find hilarious and the other, is when they are just laughing with you. You just want to touch them. All the time. You’re always drunk on them. Suddenly their body becomes a map, a diagram, a place to create pathways with your own fingertips. You’ll treat this as a delicate right of passage, as though someone is letting you touch gold. You’re an artist who wants to draw across their canvas. You’re a scientist who wants to invent new ways to hear them softly moan in your ear. You’re an explorer who wants to discover all the places you’re body fits with theirs. You don’t want to go to sleep unless they’ve said goodnight. Their morning voice is the best sound in the world. The way they pretend to be so mad at you for waking them, but you can tell they’re smiling. When they fold into you. When they hang off every word you say. When they ask you questions because suddenly you’ve become an encyclopaedia. Then they tease you for being a know-it-all when really they probably already knew the answers themselves. You smell them everywhere. In your bed sheets, on your clothes, as soon as they walk into the room. They smell like pine oak in the spring, like firewood in the winter, like the smell of rain on a summer night. You want to be surrounded by it, because you’ve never smelt anything so sweet, so alive, it makes you feel safer. You search for them in a crowded room. You miss them after five minutes. You want them to call first, but they want you to call first and then you end up calling anyway. Then you argue about it. Then you laugh about it. Then they hang up and call you back. “See baby, I did call you first,” The way they look at you. The way they spell and say your name. You study them. It’s almost like over time you develop a degree in them. You know their coffee order, you know what days they do laundry because they’ll call you to borrow clothes. You know their favourite colours, what makes them laugh, what they think is stupid, what turns them on, what books they’ll read, what movies they’ll pick, everything they hate about themselves you’ll love even more. Yet you’ll still feel as though there are a million more things you can learn. You look forward to the holidays even more. You want to buy that silly little love bear on Valentines Day. You want them to try your Mum’s turkey on Thanksgiving because you swear it’s the best. You want to pick a Christmas tree, dust it with snow, and tell them that their smile is brighter than the star that sits on top. You want to see the world with them. You want to watch them squirm in France as you force them to taste snails. But then watch them fall in love with you all over again under the Eiffel tower. You want to hire a sailboat in Greece and tell them they have to navigate to the next island. You want to throw a coin in the Trevi Fountain in Rome and have them turn to you and say, “I don’t mind if the wish doesn’t come true. I already found you”. You want to explore Disneyland with them, buy those silly matching ears and refuse to wear them until they beg you. No one has ever looked as sexy in your clothes as they do. You just wish they would go everywhere wearing nothing but your shirt. You want to make things for them. In your head you cringe because it’s sappy and corny but you don’t care. You’ll sit for hours writing letters, writing songs, making a stupid little bracelet out of paper just so you can give it to them and say, ‘Hey you, I love you’. They’ll never take it off. You change the wallpaper on your phone to a photo of you both kissing. Then you change it back again because you think you’re being over the top. But you still go into your pictures to look at it. Then suddenly they’re calling and you’d forgotten you had already assigned that same photo as their caller ID. You’ll answer all worked up over a damn photo and all you hear is, “I can’t wait to kiss you again today,” You think about the future. Marrying them. It scares you. It excites you. You don’t know whether to think about it but you can’t help it. You think about whether you’ll get a cat or dog first. They want a cat, but you want a dog and in the end you know you’ll get that damn cat first. Then one night they come over holding their hands behind their back. “What are you doing,” you’ll say. They’ll hand you a small stuffed dog from Walmart and grin, “Baby I got us a puppy,” It’s never enough. You always just want more. Longer kisses. Longer hugs. Making love over and over again. You’ll drive around the block five times just to keep them another hour. Everything is another story to the bookshelf you’re building. You put them first. Their happiness is more important. You learn to love what they love. You’ll want to be better. Because they’ve made you better.