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We never really talked about the night Duncan grabbed me. He never pressured me or pushed me to report Duncan, even if it would have been the logical thing to do. I think he knew pushing the issue would cause me to shut down on him, stop telling him the few things I allowed myself to offload. I was always grateful that Joseph gave me a lifeline that night, and I swore I wouldn’t be a persistent inconvenience in his life—but as it turned out, it wasn’t the only night I would call him in sheer desperation.

For a few weeks, everything at home felt settled. My mother was released after a day in custody, but Duncan was held longer due to prior and outstanding issues with the police. Mum swore she was done with him, muttering things to herself between drinks at home and nights out with other men. It gave me a few weeks of silence where I didn’t have to worry about Duncan arriving. One night after school when my mother was out, Joseph fitted a better lock on my bedroom door, just to give me some more peace of mind.

Then Duncan was released.

There was no warning, no build-up, just the kicking down of the back door after he climbed over the garden fence so he could get into the house without calling too much attention from the neighbours. The argument between him and my mother started, setting the tone for the next few hours. When I was unable to block it out, I needed a distraction, and so I called Joseph. I told myself it was just so I could focus on the conversation between us rather than the screams and slamming downstairs. When he asked if I could get out of the house without being noticed and offered to pick me up, I agreed. I picked up my packed bag, slipped out of the house, and walked the short distance to where he said we should meet.

Again, I stayed in his room.

Again, he stayed on the sofa.

It quickly became a routine, one that neither of us seemed to think was weird or untenable. Sometimes, if I knew early in the day that Duncan would be around the house in the evening, Joseph would pick me up from the same shops he had the afternoon he changed the locks for me. I would get in his car, and he would drive us to the cinema, or the bowling alley, or any number of mundane locations where we would spend some time before we went back to his, slipping into the house under cover of darkness to resume our little routine.

Me in his bedroom, sleeping safe and soundly in his bed.

Him on the sofa.

We would always have breakfast and coffee together in the morning before going into school. I never saw either of his housemates. One had moved into Christian’s old bedroom and worked a night shift. The other apparently insisted on getting a full ten hours of sleep and didn’t believe in seeing the day before the clock reached eight. Even without meeting them, I knew staying under the roof of a house containing two strangers and my teacher, I was safer than the nights I had endured before I met Joseph.

All I felt was gratitude.

When it came time to sit my exams, he offered for me to stay over before each one so I could have a peaceful sleep. The night before my history exam, he helped me study, testing me on my knowledge as he cooked me a healthy tea. I slept better than ever before and felt rested for my exams.

Still alone in his room as he slept downstairs.

It was prom night when everything changed, when I stopped believing things between us were innocent. His rotation at the school was finished, so he was no longer a teacher there. What unfolded after that beautiful and explosive night were a few blissful months together. It may have been short in time, but it was filled with declarations of love and promises of forever. Then everything ended, and I doubted those blissful months, as well as all the compassion and kindness that had come before. I felt like the ending had been so cruel and brutal that there was no way somebody who could do that to somebody else could have meant all the things I thought special and genuine. I felt bereft and inexplicably used.

For months after he left, I heard nothing about him. It was like he had fallen from the face of the earth. Then he appeared on the small screen, a hot new actor and rising UK star. After that, he was in the magazines and on the internet pages, and Hannah was on his arm. Articles ran with headlines like “Don’t get excited, ladies, he’s a taken man!” and “Top 30 under 30 to make your panties drop,” as was featured in a less than high quality article.

Pictures of Hannah with Joseph tortured me. She had the longest, glossiest brown hair, big, beautiful hazel eyes, porcelain and flawless skin, and she was always dressed to impress. She exuded a level of class that I would never replicate, and I knew we were from different worlds. For the first time, I started to see that Joseph was from a different world to me too. He belonged in her world. I wasn’t worthy, and I was reminded constantly by their images in the press just how far apart we were.

The magazines treated Hannah almost like she was the wife or girlfriend of a footballer. She was featured in articles showing how to get her style. It felt like torture, but more so when photographs were published of the two of them together. They always looked so loved-up and devoted.

The summer of the year after he left me behind, there was an article with pictures of them on holiday. Of him rubbing suntan lotion on her. Of them sharing food, him feeding her from his own fork. Of them embracing in the swell of the sea as his hands rested on her pert bottom in her tiny white bikini bottoms. Of her staring adoringly at him as they posed outside award shows or celebrity events.

Every time, it felt like a stab in my heart. Always a reminder that he chose her over me. Even after she died it didn’t ease. There were photographs of Joseph looking forlorn and desolate, with headlines claiming he had lost the love of his life.

He once held me close and whispered in my ear that I was the love of his life.

He still chose her.

Even now, after hearing his version of events, it’s not any easier to accept. Should I be grateful that he did love me? Should I be relieved that he regretted leaving me behind? It doesn’t feel like the admissions have done much to ease the hurt and pain.

And yet, I know it has. Maybe not a lot, maybe it won’t ease everything, but there is something in me that has changed this evening. I used to envision that I had a little box inside me where I’d stored the feelings that I used to have for him, tucked away so I wouldn’t have to think about it all the time, so I could stop feeling it all too. Now it feels like a little chip has been tapped against the tight welds around that box, and that some emotions might seep out. I can’t decide whether it’ll be the anger and hurt that contaminates my body or whether there’s any chance it’ll be the affection. The adoration. The gratitude. The infatuation.

The things I let convince me meant love.

“What are you thinking?” he asks. He puts his half-finished dessert on the arm of the sofa and then twists his body to angle himself towards me.

“I was thinking about prom,” I admit.

He suddenly looks a little flushed. I want to reach over and stroke his face, see if his cheeks are as warm as they look. I remember he blushed like this that night too, but I know I had my own flushed cheeks. That night, I felt like my whole body was ablaze. It reminded me of whenever I’d seen videos of alcohol being set alight, like I was surrounded by a blue-burning flame whenever he touched me, looked at me, whispered into my ear.

“Is it weird that I had the most amazing night at your prom when I didn’t even attend?” he asks, laughing slightly.

“I didn’t attend either,” I point out.

“It was still an amazing night. Our little non-prom.”