I make the bath as hot as the hot water tank will allow, and scent it with clove oil.

Strip. Leave clothes in a pile. Towels, one coral, one rainbow, sit in a heap up against the cool porcelain, on the hot purple bath mat. I like the colour combo: it clashes hideously, and I love it.

The water turns grey slowly as I scrub hard with the bristle brush. The bristles get clogged with my skin, so I wash the brush, and scrub again. I scrub my feet, taking particular care between the toes, then wash the brush, scrub my calves, my thighs, wash the brush, scrub my shoulders, my hands, my forearms, wash the brush, scrub my face, my chin, my nose, wash the brush, scrub my lower back very hard, then go back to the feet.

I feel better, after. Raw. Good. My skin is pink, though that could be the gin.

I think about G, though I couldn't tell you why, exactly.

~

I join Tinder.

I don't know why.

I link up my Facebook.

The picture it automatically chooses is a beautiful one: I'm in profile, looking like a classic painting. I'm wearing a dress I made, a silk Florentine number from 1510 AD. I wonder if anyone notices what a fucking dork I am.

Nobody mentions anything.

I get fuckloads of matches, but all of them want to fuck me.

Nobody notices how irresistibly fascinating I am.

Fuck this site. Fuck these people in particular.

I text the Polish man I met by accident. I give him my new phone number. I tell him to get his ass back to London, so we can go see Miss Saigon, and he can cry without shame, and I can watch him cry without judging.

Someone on Tinder messages me: "You are a beautiful woman."

I bulldoze him with fascinating facts about ants.

See?

This. This is why I dress down. This is why I don't like dressing up.

Fuck these people in particular.

~

My new apartment is small, clean, well kept. My roommate, Swedish. Her English is very good, but she draws out and rolls her OO's, which always sounds a bit weird to my ear.

I practice Italian. I don't know why. I can't seem to retain anything.

I guess this is what getting old feels like. I don't like it very much.

~

I think about G. Two people kiss on the movie I'm watching: she relents finally and grabs his ears when he isn't paying attention, and then they are kissing.

I think of G. I think of his face, the curve of his jaw under my hand. I wonder what he's doing. I consider writing him, but think it's probably a bad idea.

I think of the way his chin hair grows in every direction except out.

I remember listening to his voicemails, and getting so angry I wanted to throw my phone. Or that I wept at my own weakness.

I remember his smell, and it almost undoes me.

~

The Polish man doesn't respond. This isn't unusual. He's in LA, trying to be famous or something. He'll get back to me in a couple days, a week, a month. I don't know. I'm okay with it.

~

Pictures roll across my Facebook feed. Friends from the ship, posting photos of Jamaica, of Mexico. The Panama Canal.

All the fun they're having.

I used to do this too: post fabulous pictures, making all my friends jealous. Using their envy as a blanket to shield myself from all the fucking shitty bits.

~

I hope the Polish man texts me back, but I don't hold my breath.

I've forgotten what it's like to fall in love.

I don't feel beautiful, and I hate it when people tell me that I am, because I feel that they're only angling to get something from me.

Can't we just chill out, have a gin an soda?

.

Rosie.

Before&After