That is where I keep her.

When we met she didn’t go for the jugular like others always did. She aimed for the chest and slipped through like butter.

The chest is a safe. It is a cage in which we keep all that life depends on. Somehow, somehow hearts have found a way to leave you for others. They say you give your heart away, but really, you have no say. The heart leaves you.

My heart left me for another woman. And for the first time I felt it happen. Her hand reached for my shirt and went right through to my breast and didn’t stop. She went further, past my skin, into the darkness of my body and her hand made a fleshy fist of my heart. That’s where it stayed; where it still stays. It is where I let her live inside me.

The chest is a keeper of things in the world outside as well as the one within. Things stay until removed. One day she pulled her hand out. It was a still a fist. Inside it, was what once took my breath away. And now twice.

She didn’t take my heart. She opened her fingers and let go. I still have the scar from where she kissed me when she left.

I no longer recognise what exists inside my chest. Once you give it away, it refuses to ever belong to you completely. A heart once held in the hand bears another shape altogether, and it is not yours.