Let This Moment Last Forever

As we edged tentatively towards one another in the car park, a brief civil war raged inside me, still terrified I was somehow misreading the signs. High voltage electricity ricocheted around my body, building, too much to contain. This had got to go somewhere.

The trouble was I liked this girl too much. I found her face so god damn pretty I could barely hold her gaze for longer than two seconds. She was the perfect woman I’d been waiting for. Like she’d been custom designed for me in a workshop in heaven. I loved it all, her looks, her body, her personality, even her smell.

So I sprinted headlong through the barrage of nerves to embrace this precious moment, knowing such moments didn’t grow on trees, and wasting them would come with a debt of regret I could no longer afford.

I had imagined this so many times. I had willed it, but feared it at the same time. What would it lead to? Was this one genuine? Would it endure? Was I the masochistic coconut climbing back up onto the shy against his better judgement? I didn’t know if I’d be able to get back up from this one if it didn’t go well.

I’d had opportunities to make it happen but had stopped myself, overwhelmed by the what-ifs. Finally, she grew impatient and laid her cards on the table. Or at least that’s what I was hoping. But what if…

And then it happened. The thing I would never be ready for, but had to get on board with right there and then and stay on top of without overthinking it, like surfing or a benevolent rodeo.

The first kiss!

There, in the gently tumbling snow, in the speckled sodium lighting of the countryside pub car park where we’d shared two happy dates. Not a single soul in sight. It was perfect, like it had all been arranged in secret, just for us.

A flood of warmth ran through me as her silken ripe red lips pressed up against mine. Jesus Christ was this even really happening. Instinctively I grabbed her around her waist and pulled her in closer. Over the hump of the initial terror, we both loosened up a little and came at it with renewed vigour, now opening our mouths and allowing our tongues to touch. Parts of my brain that hadn’t seen the light of day for centuries seemed to be coming to life. A peel of church bells rang out, hailing a royal celebration in my heart.

I felt like I’d unknowingly been hibernating for a thousand years and had just been awoken with a magic kiss. And what a happy awakening.

The moment was too much to let slip through my fingers like the rest.

I prayed to God that that this moment would last forever.

In an uncharacteristic move, God answered this time.

He appeared to me briefly up on his cloud throne, wearing his signature tunic and sandals, thronged by pious angels strumming lyres. He very briefly weighed up my proposition while playing with his beard, then nodded in agreement and vanished in a flash of violet smoke.

I wanted to ask her if she’d seen it too.

But I couldn’t move. I was frozen in the moment, just as requested.

Well I must say you have to be careful what you wish for.

I don’t know why I wished that moment would last forever, because what I’ve learned since is that, contrary to popular belief, those moments last precisely the correct amount of time. In fact, I’d like to meet the sociopath who came up with the idiotic concept of making a moment last forever, and beat the crap out of him with a cricket bat. Maybe I’d make that moment last forever instead.

I stopped counting the days after the first few weeks.

I’ve learned that boredom has a pendular aspect to it. It accumulates and weighs down heavy, like a shelf of snow on an alpine cliff top before an avalanche. Then the dam breaks, and the mind breaks along with it, leaving you in a state of detached catatonia. For a blissful while you feel absolutely nothing at all. Then the process repeats. And repeats. And repeats…

Her spittle started to go stagnant after about day two. I soon came to despise her taste and smell as I strongly suspect she did mine.

Over time, I started spotting all manner of imperfections I hadn’t even noticed before. Her face is covered in the most irregular freckles. I used to think they were charming but now I just see asymmetrical blemishes.

There’s a bit of sleep in her left eye. It’s fucking repugnant. Like eye fungus. I desperately want to get an eye bath to it, but I guess that’s not gonna happen any time soon.

And while we’re on the eyes, they’re lopsided for fuck’s sake! Like a Picasso painting. How could I have missed this? What exactly are my criteria for “good enough for me”? Two arms and legs and a working vagina?

Note to self: if I ever get out of this thing, make a check list.

She has the remnant of a bogey hanging from a barely perceivable hair just protruding from her right nostril. You wouldn’t even notice it normally but given enough time …

Did she pick that bogey and that’s what was left behind? Perhaps I’m being mean and it was the unfortunate result of a sneeze. We’ll never know.

Maybe she picked it and ate it?

OH GOD! I can’t go on like this.

Way back in the early days I formulated a plan to wait for a passing stranger and get their attention, but of course there were no strangers, and besides, I was frozen anyway. It seems my wish was indeed for time to stand still and the moment to last forever; yet to be conscious throughout the whole thing. Of course – how else could I enjoy it?

Was God punishing me for my lack of attention to detail? What’s he getting out of all this? Perhaps it’s passive aggressive payback for some past transgression – maybe all the times I used his name in vain. To be fair I do say “Oh God” and “Jesus Christ” a Hell of a lot. Oh maybe it’s “Hell” he doesn’t like? That would make a lot of sense actually.
I suppose I’ll never know.

I honestly don’t know what the Hell I’m supposed to do now. I tried praying for the moment to stop again but God pointedly didn’t reply this time, which is normally how it goes with these things. I guess lightning doesn’t strike twice after all. That guy has a malevolent streak if you ask me. God of compassion my ass. He knew damn well how this would play out. And a joke’s a joke but this shit is getting old.

I don’t seem to get hungry as such but everything feels more stale and samey somehow. It feels like some nondescript kind of internal decay has taken root.
Oh I don’t know – maybe I’m, imagining it.
I think the lack of novelty is slowly driving me insane. Nothing new to look forward to, no change, nothing to brush the cobwebs away and reboot my system.

I’ll be honest – I’m willing a quick death at this point but I don’t think it works like that somehow.

My mind will go first though, I know it.

I tell you what, if this does end, if I never have to lay my eyes on her ugly smelly spongey fat fucking stupid cabbage patch doll face again, it will be too soon.

What the HELL did I ever see in her?

Vile greasy bulbous suppurating lump of suet!

I HATE YOU I HATE YOU I HATE YOU!

Get your foul leathery lizard lips away from me and LEAVE ME ALONE already lady!

Oh please God I just want this moment to end!?