"What can I do then?" Dave pleads. Fireworks crackle in the far distance, tiny sparks in the harbour from the height of the mountaintop. I hold onto him, swaying from the punch and the altitude, "Just feel loved."

It's all I can tell him. We are in the past. My love for him will burn beneath my layers of skin, toughened skin, aged and stretched skin, but not yet sagging because sagging is a weakening, and I will not stand down.

He continues, "They say that most people use only ten percent of their brains. I think the more important statistic is that most people use only ten percent of their hearts."

Dave. The first time I realized my supercapacity to love was with him. I learned to open, to sparkle, in his eyes and hands. And then I learned how to walk away.

But there on the candle-lit patio I had one of the best nights of my life. Drenched in love. Green, high up, mountain air drifts in across the banquet table and dance floor.

I sat and studied boys from my past. Men now. We don't look like adults do we?

Julie, I give her a gentle nudge, "So when are you getting married?"

Travelling down the mountain the skyride dips over the first tower, we sweep out, and there's my city, our city. WE MADE IT. Criss-crossing rows of orange lights, the sky studded with so many stars. Swaying in the tram, calla lily perfume and cedar trees; I'm drunken two-fold.

We stumble down Nancy Greene Way, and it's like things were. We still own this neck of Grouse Woods. Dave grabs me and piggybacks me down the middle of the road, and I laugh too loud for this late at night.

Afterparty. I jump inthe pool, cold water on my hot drunken skin, alive, I want only to feel this alive always. On the deck I hold my lighter for Liam then Dave. Three hearts. Love, love, love... I can't stop the beating of my heart.

I slept that night in the twin bed I grew up in. So quiet, the clock tick-tocks down the hall. I curl up my arms and shiver, thinking about our age and the momentum of the pace of our lives. I want to stay in this bed, taken care of, forevermore.

In the morning light shines onto my face. Light! I walk out in a blanket and twist and apple from the tree, sunwarm imperfect rosy-skinned.

In front of the mirror I look at myself, apple in hand. Soft light billows in through the sheer curtains. Like a flower I turn to face the sun, and something changes and I see in myself not the flaws and the darkness but a resonating light and the reflection of a face so obviously my own but so strangely foreign. With your own eyes you can never exactly see your own face.

I sit on the back doorstep and peel apples. THIS IS IT. The pie bakes in the oven. LET THERE BE LIGHT. I take the pie out to cool. LOOK UP.

This sloppy pie is my heart, and I'm sharing it with you.