On the eve of my 34th birthday I considered my life and came to the conclusion that it was pretty damn good. Not perfect maybe, but then whose life ever really is? Sure if I could there were things I would change but, as it stood, I was pretty happy.

I'd managed, somehow and I still don't know how, to land a job with an up and coming record label. A job which, amongst other things, meant getting to see numerous new bands playing live and then recommending only the best to the label. And as a result signing some pretty incredible talent before the opposition even knew they existed. I seemed to have some innate ability to recognise those bands who could actually make it, well either that or I'd been really lucky so far. On reflection it was probably the latter.

Along with the job I had developed the friendship of an amazing man. We'd hit it off from the moment we met in the label's small but modern offices, almost three years ago, and our friendship had blossomed from the very first word.

We seemed to share the same sense of humour, the same taste in music and the same view of life. We connected in a way I hadn't known since… well not for a very long time.

Nathan was an inch or two shorter than me, slender but still strongly muscular looking. His dark hair was swept back in a short style reminiscent of the 50's and his dark eyes always held that hint of humour and happiness that was often described as a "glint". He was a mate, a good mate, but more than that. Nathan was a confidant and a shoulder to lean on, just as I hoped I was for him.

Despite the connection we both felt, despite our closeness and mutual respect there had never been anything between us but friendship. I could look at Nathan and know I was seeing a handsome, attractive man and yet I was never personally attracted to him. Which is just as well as Nathan never really went for blondes, oh or for men! Although one drunken night he did tell me of some "experimenting" he did in his youth but later came to the decision that the female form was far more to his liking. And he had continued to enjoy the fairer sex ever since.

So I suppose the only major thing missing in my life, at the grand old age of 33 years, 11 months, 3 weeks, 6 days and about 20 hours, was love.

That's not so say I was without offers, plenty of which I took up too, and while that was good and physically satisfying it wasn't love. Even with the men who had lasted beyond a few heated tumbles in the bedroom it had never been love. Affection, sure. Fondness, of course. Love? I'm afraid not. And I knew it wasn't love because I'd had that once before.

At 23 years of age I watched the love I thought would last for the rest of my life begin to crumble. I had honestly believed that we were going to make it, that we had found the magic key to happiness and that key was each other. For the first few years together we'd been right as well.

Setting up home together in Dublin had been exciting and terrifying. Each day I expected something to go wrong and each day I woke to find the man I loved in my arms. Now that was love. Real honest to goodness, can't live without you love. We were a couple; happy, content… nothing could touch us or shake us. We'd been through hell to get where we were but we'd made it.

And then… it was over.

I can still remember the last thing he ever said to me. He. I don't know when I last used his name. The friends I have now, friends like Nathan, who have heard all about my broken love, still only know that man as "he". It's as if using his name would burn my mouth. By saying it I would make him real again and I couldn't do that. Losing him nearly destroyed me, reliving that loss surely would and so reducing the man who I had loved more than my own life to a mere "he" I somehow made it less real, less painful and I could talk about him without breaking down.

So there I was at 23, feeling my heart slowly breaking into a million pieces and not being able to stop it.

He had held my face that day. One hand on each side, holding me tendering but firmly and I dreaded the moment he would let go because I knew I would never experience his touch again.

His deep molten chocolate eyes were fixed on mine; his long dark lashes glistening with the tears that tumbled heavily down his cheeks, a perfect match for those that I wept as I prepared to hear him say goodbye.

We both knew it was coming and there was no escape. We had tried, so hard and for so long but ultimately we couldn't survive.

For a long time after I blamed him because I needed a reason. So in my mind I made up a million of them, but the reality was that the break up was nobodies fault, we just weren't meant to be. Maybe we had been too young, too idealistic, maybe we just hadn't realised that you needed more than love to make something work.

At the start we had been all we needed, just each other and that was enough. But eventually the reality of life had to sink in and I guess we just weren't strong enough to survive it. I was working as many nights as I could as a DJ at a local club and he would work all day, and sometimes late into the evening, in a financial company where he hoped to rise quickly through the ranks. After working so hard at his studies to gain the degree that got his foot in the door I knew that he had to work equally hard to impress his new employers, but that didn't make it any easier, for either of us.

In the end we hardly saw each other, our lives began to pull us in different directions and where we had once been soul mates we were slowly becoming strangers. And when we did find time for each other, rather than enjoying it we would, more often than not, end up arguing over the smallest thing until it was hard to remember what it was that was keeping us together.

"John Paul," his voice had been so soft, so filled with anguish and love that it tore at my very soul. My name had never sounded so beautiful or so terrible. "John Paul McQueen I love you… I have always loved you and I… I think I always will…" He swallowed hard as a fresh wash of tears coated his cheeks and I held my breath as I waited for the words that I knew I didn't want to hear but that I couldn't avoid.

"I love you," he said again, even softer this time, almost hushed, "But if I don't go now we're just gonna keep on fighting until… well I'm scared that I'll end up hating you and I… I couldn't bare that… I'm sorry John Paul… I… I'm just so sorry…"

He kissed me then. One last kiss, one final farewell. His mouth was warm and soft, moist with the fusion of our tears as I tried to memorise the sensation of his mouth against mine. Our lips trembled against each other's as our kiss mingled with our tears until he finally pulled back from me and all the warmth I had ever known was gone. I wanted to grab him and beg him not to go. To tell him that I loved him more than my own life; but I didn't. Because he already knew. I wanted to argue against what he had said but I couldn't. Because I knew he was right. I think we had both known for some time that what we had was dying, but I hadn't been brave enough to say it, finally one of us had to though and that strength had belonged to him.

As much as seeing him walking away, and never once looking back, broke my heart, I think that growing to hate him and have him hate me would have broken it more. For so many years he was my life, my heart and my soul. He was the reason I woke up every morning and the love that encompassed me while I slept. He was mine just as I was his and I had believed we would be for always. But I'd been wrong.

"Where are we going now?" I asked Nathan, my voice slightly slurred as my feet tangled themselves beneath me, causing me to trip and stumble slightly. It was some time after eleven thirty and I was a little tipsy. Quite a bit tipsy. OK I was a couple of pints short of being paralytic, but as Nathan had so convincingly explained – It was almost my birthday so I deserved to let my hair down.

The afternoon had begun with the six of us, but as one hour slid drunkenly into the next, each of my friends had said their goodbyes and faded away into the growing darkness of the night, leaving just the two of us to see if we could make it to midnight and welcome in the anniversary of my birth.

"We need another drink!" Nathan exclaimed gleefully, pushing me towards yet another pub and causing me to stagger through the doorway that I only just avoided crashing into. "And I think it's my round."

I tried to argue, as almost every round since we started out five hours earlier had seemed to be Nathan's round, but it was too late, he was already at the bar waiting to be served.

I looked around the pub as I sauntered over to join him, trying to look stone cold sober and probably failing miserably. I had vague recollections of the bar but it seemed different to how I recalled. Although the basic layout remained unchanged the gaudy flock wallpaper had been replaced and what had once been a sticky, dirty carpet was now a deep plush maroon that seems to caress my feet as I walked.

"Two lagers please," Nathan asked leaning against the bar and flashing the barmaid his brightest smile, his eyes twinkling with mischief.

The barmaid smiled back at him. Of course she was paid to smile at the customers, but I had never known a woman yet who was immune to the brightness of Nathan's charm.

In an involuntary act she ran one hand down the length of her hair, its golden locks resting on the tops of her shoulders and glistening under the fluorescent lights. Her smile was wide, her shiny pink lips parting to show a row of perfectly straight, white teeth and her eyes seemed to grow brighter, their blue becoming more intense as she looked at my friend.

Reaching for an empty pint glass the blonde woman broke eye contact with Nathan and poised the glass beneath the lager pump. A splutter of foam was her only reward and she smiled coyly, raising her eyes in amused apology as she turned her head to call through a door behind her.

"The lagers off… It wont be long," she said with a smile, "My husband will just have to change the barrel."

"That's alright," Nathan replied, resting his arms on the bar and leaning in a little closer, "Tell him he can take as long as he likes."

The barmaid giggled girlishly at Nathan's words, probably a well-practiced act used on all of the attractive customers who chose to flirt with her, but extracting a further smile from my friend all the same.

"What was that?" A voice called from the door that obviously led to the cellar.

Everything seemed to stop, or maybe it went faster, it certainly began to spin. Every drop of alcohol that I had consumed over the past few hours seemed to instantly find its way to my brain and I had to grip the bar to stop myself from falling down. But I knew it wasn't really the lager or the vodka or the triple sambucca shots that were making me feel like that. It was that sound, that voice, but I knew it couldn't really be and I took deep breaths to try and calm myself as the gap in the door was pushed open to reveal the barmaid's, or was it landlady's, husband.

"What was that?" the dark haired man asked again, a gentle affectionate hand coming to rest on the woman's shoulder, her own hand rising instinctively to meet it as she half turned to face him.

"The lager's gone off sweetheart," she said with a loving smile that showed just how fake the one she had shared with Nathan really was, "Could you get the barrel changed? We've got thirsty customers here."

The man turned to us to apologise for the delay and I saw the words die on his lips.

His eyes, like two molten chocolate pools, widened as they saw me and his mouth opened but no words came out. I couldn't take my gaze from his lips, their shape so painfully familiar even after all these years. And that drop of spilled chocolate that had formed into a mole resting on top of his upper lip, just where I had kissed it a million times.

"Craig," my ex-lover's wife prompted with a gentle push, "The barrel…"

"Right… yeah…" Craig turned and raced through the doorway as his wife turned her smile back towards Nathan and shrugged her shoulders with a small laugh.

I don't really remember leaving the bar, I don't recall turning and running out of there but I must have done because the next thing I knew I was standing in the gutter with my hands on my thighs as I vomited heavily onto the road. My whole body was trembling but I knew it wasn't the exertion of my retching that was causing it.

"I guess someone's had enough then," Nathan's voice said kindly from behind me, his hand patting my back as I stood shaking and gasping for air. "Time for home yeah?"

Wiping my mouth on the back of my hand I righted myself, I could feel the cool air against my face and I knew then that it was streaked with tears.

"John Paul what… what is it?" Nathan's brow furrowed with concern.

He had seen me drunk many times before, he'd seen me vomit until I though I would bring up my entire set of internal organs, but the look of worry on his face let me know the anguish that must have been showing on mine.

"It's… Craig…" I stammered, the sound of that man's name beautifully terrifying in my mouth. And I was right, saying it again after all this time burned, but it was a fire I relished because saying it again felt like breathing for the first time after living my life in a vacuum.

"What's Craig?" Nathan asked without comprehension.

"It is… he is… in there…"

"Yeah the new landlord…"

"You knew? You knew he was the new landlord in there and you still took me in?"

"John Paul you're not making any sense… who is he?"

"Craig!" I said as if that one name was explanation in itself, but of course it wasn't because Nathan had never once heard me utter that name before a few moments ago.

"John Paul tell me," Nathan urged, his hands gripping my shoulders firmly, strongly, his eyes bright with concern as he smiled his encouragement.

"Craig," I said again, the word only a whisper as I looked over Nathan's shoulder to gaze through the window of the pub. I saw Craig back behind the bar, taking to the beautiful blonde woman, his wife. I wondered if he was asking her where I had gone. I was hoping he was. I was hoping he wasn't.

"What about Craig?" Nathan asked.

"Craig he's… he's my HIM… he's the one… he's… he's… Craig…"

Nathan's brow furrowed for a moment and then his eyes grew wide with understanding. "You don't mean he's the one you told me about… from Dublin? The one big love?"

I nodded sadly as a fresh wave of tears poured from my eyes, Nathan's arm slipping around my shoulder to comfort me and offer the strength that I so desperately needed.

"I'm sorry mate," he said kindly, "I had no idea… How could I? If I'd know…"

"Get me home."

Somewhere in the distance I heard a church clock chime midnight. 'Happy birthday,' I thought to myself.

But it was far from it.

The morning of my 34th birthday dawned brightly, the dazzling sunlight streaming through the window and piercing my eyelids. I curse myself for forgetting to draw the curtains before I had fallen into bed, but then I hadn't been in much of a state for anything by the time I got home.

My head pounded with the sound of a dozen pneumatic drills as they tried their best to plunder my brain, my throat burned with the feel of ground glass and my stomach muscles ached from the constant retching that had lasted long after my stomach had been emptied.

I'd had hangovers before, plenty of them. You didn't work in the music industry without going on a bender or two, but this was different. It was different because it wasn't the physical discomfort that was so unbearable, I knew a few painkillers and several pints of cold fresh water would take the edge off that. It was the terrible ache in my chest that caused my breath to catch and a fresh wave of nausea hit me.

How could Craig Dean have appeared back in my life so casually? How could he have just been there like he had never been gone? And how could I still feel that terrible longing that I thought had long since passed?

Hoisting myself upright I groaned as all the agonies of my flesh assaulted me at once. Looking down at myself I grimaced. It seemed I hadn't so much made it into bed as ended up collapsing on top of it still fully dressed. My once pale blue shirt was wrinkled and covered in stains that I preferred not to think about and my black jeans were half undone but I hadn't managed to actually remove them. One shoe was still on my foot and I spotted the other across the room. I was just grateful that I wasn't in the view of any mirror because there was no doubting I must have been a terrible sight.

Flinging my legs off the bed I sat on the edge for a moment, waiting for the room to stop spinning, before getting to my feet and peeling the clothes off my body that felt grimy and uncomfortable, leaving them in a pile on the floor to be collected later, if and when I found the strength.

I'd always loved my studio apartment, located on an upper floor in a converted warehouse. Its open plan created a cool clear space devoid of any real clutter, with the possible exception of my own mini music studio in one corner, and looking around it always made me feel like I'd "made it".

But as I shuffled, naked and hunched over, to the bathroom, it felt cold and empty and I longed for the busy colourful home of my youth. I felt very alone.

Padding onto the cold white tiles of the bathroom floor I steeled myself as I stood before the sink, gripping its edge before slowly raising my eyes to the large mirror above it.

I winced at what I saw there.

My hair was stood up at unruly angles and appeared dirty and matted, the sight made my scalp itch. My eyes were red, bloodshot and swollen with dark rings beneath. I really did look as bad as I felt and I was relieved that I had had the foresight to take the rest of the week off work. No one needed to see the mess of a human being that I could see in the mirror.

Turning on the shower I gingerly stepped beneath the full force of the hot water, turning the dial until the temperature was almost enough to burn my skin. But at the same time it felt soothing as I shampooed and soaped away the grim that seemed to be clinging to me like a dirty overcoat.

Closing my eyes I raised my face into the pulsating stream of hot water and rested my hands against the moist tiles. My chest heaved as if I had been running for miles and my heart raced, pounding in my chest in a way it hadn't done for so many years.

Try as I might I couldn't keep the thoughts from my mind and, behind my darkened lids, I could see him again.

Craig. My Craig. Not the version of him that I had seen the previous night but the Craig I had known all those years ago. Memories tumbled over each other, vying for my attention, each one more painful and more wonderful than the last. I could hear him telling me he loved me for the first time, a drunken foolish childish kiss that had changed everything, I could feel his hands on me, pawing at me with a desperate longing that I had tried to resist and I could feel, clearer than anything else, how it was to hold him in my arms, to make love to him and to know he was mine.

Running my hands over my face I washed away the tears that had escaped from my closed eyes and turned off the shower. Wrapping myself in a large white towel and I made my way to the kitchen, a trail of water and moist footprints following my progress. The shower had made me feel more human but my body still craved a cure for its physical pains. I knew there would be no cure for the other pain I was feeling. How could there be?

A walk in the fresh air, I decided, what just what I needed to blow away the last vestiges of pain that the paracetamol hadn't cured. The tablets had been washed down with two large glasses of chilled water and followed by a very strong black coffee and I was starting to feel a bit more alive.

I didn't make any conscious decisions of where I was going, or at least I didn't admit as much to myself, but it wasn't a total surprise that my feet led me back to the pub I had raced out of several hours earlier.

Looking through the window I could see that the bar had only a smattering of customers that early in the afternoon and a dark haired young barmaid was stood leaning against the wall, twirling her hair around one finger and looking decidedly bored.

There was no sign of him. I laughed silently to myself, old habits and all that… there was no sign of Craig.

Taking a deep breath I pushed open the large wooden double doors and stepped inside. The familiar odour of alcohol that lingered in every bar I had ever visited rested in the air and my stomach flipped with a feeling of slight nausea for a moment before settling down again.

"What can I get ya?" The dark haired barmaid asked with a pleasant, if not very convincing, smile as she stepped forward. She looked young, probably not even 20 yet, and for a moment I envied her that, I wanted to be 20 again, to have the chance to do it all again, but better. Her neatly shaped eyebrows raised in a silent repetition of her question as her lightly lipsticked mouth curled into a small smile.

"Erm… I…" I hadn't thought this through. Should I ask for him? Should I order a drink? Should I just turn and run and save myself from whatever it was that would happen next. "Orange juice please," I heard myself saying, it looked like I was staying for at least one drink.

Sipping at my juice I glanced around the bar and it suddenly struck me what it was that was so eerily familiar about the place, despite the different layout there was something in the décor very reminiscent of The Dog in The Pond and I laughed softly to myself, almost expecting Frankie and Jack to appear at any moment.

"Quiet today," I said in some form of casual conversation directed at the, once again bored looking, barmaid.

"Yeah," She replied with a shrug of her shoulders, "Always is in the afternoons, don't know why they have me in but the landlady's always off out somewhere so I guess they need someone."

I tried not to flinch at thought of "the landlady"… Craig's wife. Taking another drink of juice I tried to keep my voice sounding as disinterested as possible.

"You worked here long then?" I asked, casually leaning on the bar and gulping down my drink.

The young woman smiled and ran her fingers slowly through her hair, I suddenly realised that she probably thought I was trying to chat her up. "Only a couple of months," she told me, "Just after the place was redone…"

"Oh… was that when the new couple took over then?"

"Yeah, place was a bit of a dump before… it's still a bit old fashioned looking if you ask me…"

Looking around at the décor again I couldn't help but smile. "I rather like it," I said as I drained the last of my orange juice. "Anyway I only stopped in for one… I'd better be going, thanks for the chat."

I'd realised as I sat there quite how ridiculous I was being. What did I think would happen? Was I really expecting Craig to fall into my arms again after all this time? Did I even want him to? We'd tried and we'd failed and sitting in the bar he now ran with his wife I realised that it was better to have the memories of what we'd been than to hope for what we never could. We were different people than we had once been, we'd both moved on and I didn't even know the Craig Dean who ran the bar I was sitting in so how could I believe I still loved him? If anything I was possibly in love with a memory, and that was the best place for what we had to remain.

With one last look around the pub I let out a relieved breath that he, Craig, hadn't come into the bar while I was still there and I could get away with my dignity intact. He never even needed to know I'd been there.

I suddenly felt calm as I pushed open the doors to make my exit.

And there he was.

Craig Dean. Preparing to enter the building just as I was preparing to leave.

We both froze mid-step and stared at each other.

I couldn't think of a single word to say, I wasn't even sure I was breathing. I didn't know if I wanted to kiss him or turn and run away. I did neither; instead I just stood there like a lifeless sculpture, frozen in the doorway of the pub unable to move.

"John Paul," he said finally, his voice breaking the spell and I gasped in a lungful of air, my head spinning as the sudden rush of oxygen filled my body. "It WAS you I saw yesterday," he continued with an uncertain smile, "You were gone so quickly I thought I must have imagined it…"

"It was me," I confirmed, my voice sounded distant and hollow in my head and I wanted to be stood anywhere but in that doorway right then.

"Right," Craig said, his dark eyes looking as confused as I felt. Should we embrace? Shake hands? Smile and walk away? Why had I even gone back there in the first place? "You left though… last night…" Craig continued.

"Yeah."

"OK… erm…"

"Look I should go," I said quickly. I needed to get out of there, I needed to be as far away from him as I could get because no matter how illogical I tried to convince myself that it was, my heart was aching with a longing that I could no longer satisfy. "I only stopped by to… I shouldn't have… I…"

"It's good to see you." Craig smiled. A real smile. A smile that began deep within him and shone brightly through his eyes and I had no choice but to return that smile until we were both grinning inanely at each other.

"You too," I replied and I realised I meant it. It really was good to see him. How many times over the years had I wondered where he was and how he was and now he was there, only an arms width away from me, close enough to reach out and hold.

I'm sure I was staring, taking in every detail that I could and storing it deep within my memory in case I never got the chance again. His deep brown eyes, glistened like melted chocolate, that touch of humour and passion still sparkling deep within them, his full soft lips curved into a warm smile that I couldn't help but echo as I watched the mole above his top lip dance as he spoke.

"You haven't changed," Craig said, making me smile more and reach up to touch my hair nervously.

"I'm older…"

"Who isn't… but you look good, you really do."

"So do you… I'm… it's nice to see you're doing OK… but I really should go."

Craig's smile faltered and he looked a little disappointed. "Oh well if you have to rush off," he said with a shrug. "I suppose you have to get back to your boyfriend…"

"Who?"

"The guy you were with last night…"

"Oh… oh no, he's just a friend." It could have been my imagination or wishful thinking but for a moment Craig looked pleased, and I was glad he did.

"I could make you a coffee," Craig suggested, "I mean if you're not in a rush?"

"I…" I knew I should say no, I knew it. "I'd like that… thanks."