Thoughts that will never leave

If you’re looking for a neat moral, I don’t have one. I have a house that remembers, a body that forgets on purpose, and a stack of drawings that tell the truth better than I ever could.

Fire and water taught me their lessons.

Dion, the flaming eye I drew in petrol and ash; the haunted-house kiss while the walls burned; the graffiti heart he sprayed on my shed and called devotion; the Ducati and the single lily left in my driveway like a dare.

Finn, boat lights drifting through Mandurah, the rope thrown true, the laughter when bare feet disappeared over a gunwale; the mastiff curled by the armchair; the cabin with warm windows where I gave his spirit somewhere to come home to.

If I’d chosen Finn, would he still be alive?


If I’d run away with Dion, would I be free?

Here is the only honest thing I can say: I loved two men the ways they taught me.

One by burning, 

One by drowning.

And then I learned to breathe.

It is written now. Not in neat strokes, but in waves of fire, water, and ink.

• The Heart Tree, drawn that fateful Christmas: its roots curl into a Trinity Knot, the first act of recognising my own strength to hold those around me.

• The Ocean Light, veil lifted to the moon, torch in hand, the sea holding me steady while I said goodbye. The night the water shared my grief.

• The Two Circles, earth and air: one bark-rough and steadfast, the other flowering and open. A conversation between the woman who held steady and strong, and the woman who found the grace to reach.

• The Armoured Woman with the Lily, soft but ready. She stands at the edge of dawn, armoured in the quiet steadiness Finn left inside me, holding Dion’s last lily, the one pure thing he gave me.

There were miracles small and incredible. An earring returned to a blanket, knocks at the window that sounded like a search for home, a puppy named Ace so a boy had something loyal to hold and a lost soul had somewhere to rest.

There were Sundays with Dire Straits and pancakes when the house played at being a family; there were nights with Pink Floyd and Cannons when grief tuned my lungs.

There were shirts that said Yippee Motherf**ker because sometimes you have to laugh while you’re pretending to adult.

The boys saved me, the way children do without trying. Nathaniel’s proud catch of fish. Westley’s never-ending antics. The ordinary gravity of bedtimes and cuddles. Their laughter kept pulling me ever upwards to take my next breath.

So this is where the book pauses for a moment to breath too.