‘Do you remember the bay in Santa Monica, Bette?’ ‘Yes, perfectly. I just had the same thought.’ ‘Why did we stop having those wonderful walks?’ ‘I don’t know.’ I raised a little to have a look into Tina’s eyes. ‘But we will start doing it again, okay?’ Tina had a deep look into my eyes and got that incredible soft, feminine and lovely look. ‘Yes, we will.’ Then she came closer and kissed my forehead. I grew stiff; her warm, soft lips, how much have I missed that too. We look each other deeply in the eyes and knew exactly what the other one was thinking. ‘It’s still too early, isn’t it?’ I asked cautious. ‘Probably, but who is to define too early?’ Tina came closer to my face. ‘We?’ I felt her breath on my skin and got a bit closer to her too. ‘Yes, we.’ Our lips touched carefully, hardly noticeable but it went through me like lightning and the flimsy prickle on my lips required more. It was one of those kisses, no, it was the kiss as such… the one that expressed everything, that came from every fiber of our bodies, that showed all the love, the longing, and the fondness that we still felt for each other, that lasted an eternity but still went by too fast, the kiss that you won’t forget for a lifetime, that you will remember and that will conjure a smile in my face for years to come.

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I closed my diary and put it back in the little box in which Tina’s diary was too. My look stayed on the inside for a while. There were nearly three years full of pain, self-hate and desire, three years of realizing and despair. Well it seemed like I needed those years, like it has been necessary for me to go through hell and back to finally arrive. I put back the cap on which was glued a big note, in red letters saying: ‘We have to remember to never forget!’ When we decided to exchange our diaries I had no idea of what I was to expect. I didn’t have a clue of the fights that Tina fought, didn’t suspect her uncountable tries of leading a more or less normal life without me, didn’t suspect how hard it really was for her and I didn’t have the slightest clue how much I really meant to her. I was so blind, so numb, so fucking selfish that I didn’t realize her uncountable signals, words and fond acts and her constant efforts to show me how much she loved me. We talked about it all for so many nights, so many days, so many hours, we had to grin together and often had to cry too. Sometimes it’s so hard to understand, but even harder it is to accept the understood. But everything was necessary to be able to start a new beginning, that we were able to leave the past behind, but not forget about it. From time to time I fetched that box, read in one of the diaries until I knew more than ever how much I loved Tina. I put the box back in the upper left drawer of the desk, and then I went out on the terrace.

Tina was still lying at the lounger at the swimming pool. I laid beside her and huddled up into her arm and she stroked my head and asked: ‘Bette? Do you remember our first kiss in Seattle?’ ‘Yes.’ I closed my eyes.