"Do you like me as I am now?" The bluish whites of Dave's eyes were like a question mark on his pale face. he seemed to have stored up a wave of courage in preperation for this chat. "Naturally, you needn't lie".

"How long have we known each other? It's almost 4 years, but it seems much longer, and we'll last a century, ten thousand years because I love you. But if you don't hurry up and get well...I can't think" I reply.

He looked at me with steel before saying "If one day I die - no don't interrupt me, I mean when I die, at that instant when I close my eyes never to open them again, what kind of a person will you think I've been?"

I didn't want to eat any more. My tongue had lost all feeling and my stomach was numb too. Separated by the plates, glasses and forks, we held each others eyes for a long time. The whites of his eyes turned bluer until, as the playwrite Joan Hawkes put it, 'they oozed a misty liquid'.

"I will H-A-T-E you", I enunciated clearly.

"Death is the expression of exhaustion, a solution arrived at rationally once one has known the deepest depths of tiredness. I've thought about it for a long time, perhaps all my life, and having thought it through, i'm not ashamed of dying. A person like me can't go on constantly polluting himself, annihilating his soul". he jabbed the left side of his chest with his finger, but it would have looked more natural if he'd used a dagger.

"It's an impulse in the dark of the soul. psychologists always say impulses are dangerous and discourage them, but an impulse comes uninvited". His voice was crystal clear and cool, his lips pale and unemotional. despite the impersonal pronoun he was talking about himself.

My despair turned to anger. "I'm not going to bullshit you. In one work, you're degenerate".

"Perhaps. the dying never have the chance to explain themselves to the living. Actually, a lot of people are even more degenerate". I clutched his hand. cold as ice.

"What are we talking about for god's sake? Don't go on. Why do we have to talk about something so horrible here and now? Don't tell me about life and death, love and hate, the ego and the id. We're alive together, aren't we? If there's something you don't like abou our life: get specific: I talk in my sleep, my novel isn't profound enough - it's utter rubbish -whatever. OK! I can change; I can try and do things perfectly. But for heaven's sake, don't say such horrible things..I'm always dreaming of finding wings and soaring inbto the sky with you, but you're always thinking of abandoning me and leaping into hell. Why?"

A lot of people were looking our way. I raised my head and saw myself in the mirror: frantic tear filled eyes, and a fierce expression. I felt really idiotic. We so obviously loved one another.

"Bev". Dave's face remained absolutely sombre. "right from the start we were too different sorts of people, I said so at the time. But that hasn't stopped us loving each other.; you so full of energy and ambition and me devoid of desire, drifting with the tide. philosophers say "everything originates in nothingness" and nothingness accentuates everything"

I interrupt. "whoever the hell said that can drop dead! Don't read those books any more. You need to be amongst living, breathing human beings. You need to do my physical work. My Dad often says "Work makes a person healthy". You needsunlight and grass , and dreams and happiness and all the joy that goes with them. For starters tomorrow you should go to that damn detox centre" I said crying, the mirrors on the wall were a blur.

He hugged me then. "You're crazy". he took out a tissue and gave it me to dry my eyes. I looked at him through my fog of tears. "i am crazy, because you are too".

That night we barely closed our eyes. We kissed through the night, and the bitterness of our saliva filled the room. Our bed drifted in the boundless sea like a lonely island in imminent danger. We took refuge in each others love.