Mr Richard.

Once upon a time, I was walking along Glebe Point Road from the entrance to Broadway shopping centre, to my car, which was parked next to the 7-11.

I was in a teensiest bit of a bad mood, because work was being lame as usual. I was on the phone, listening to Miss Nic from the Chatswood store whine about how much she disliked work at the time.

There was this boy. One of those boys who harrass you to sign up to a charity/sponsor a child/try this hand cream on the street. This one was really pretty though. I could tell he was watching me, so I stayed just withing his sight until I got off the phone, then walked back past him.

He asked how old I was. I was 21. So I lied. I told him I was only 20 still, so he couldn't keep bugging me about his charity thing...if they ask how old, it means you have to be 21 to sign up. I'm tricky like that.

When I said I was 20, he asked when my birthday was.

When I said November he said

"Oh, so we can get married in November then?"

and I said

"Oh no, the age is 18 here, we can go right now".

And the rest is history, as they say.

We didn't get married, but he listened to me cry on the phone over nasty flatmates, and I cooked meals for him when he was on his own, and he called me every week when I ran away to the States for an adventure, and he came and gave me money when I came home broke. And he came to stay at my parents on the beach, and met my grandparents. And we got an apartment together, and he helped my stepdad move all the furniture in, and I scrounged second hand stores to find us a cheap fridge, and I decorated the whole place one weekend when he was away on work, and we spent Christmas together, and drank Moet on the floor of the apartment on New Years. And I quit my job, and got a new one, and his company collapsed and left him broke. And a tonne of bills came in, and we had to scrape together money for groceries, and we're still barely getting by. And we got pregnant, and I got scared, and he made me feel better, and then we lost our baby.

And he's still the only thing making me feel better.