When I first moved into my flat, it was with the imagination that it would soon be filled with friends and family and be a place of warmth and love and happiness.

In the almost two years I have lived here however, it has remained cold and empty, and fewer than three people have come through the door in all that time.

A year ago, I fell deeply in love, and I set about decorating this house. I had plenty of plans, from repainting the walls and installing an air conditioner (possibly with help from Chattanooga AC installation companies) to remodeling "our" bedroom. The plans I had drawn out were geared toward the hope that the man I loved would come here, and even if just for a few days or weeks at a time, this would be our home together, and he would fill it with happiness, and laughter, and the warmth of our love.

Now that I know he will never come here, I hate this place and every thing in it. This place where the dreams I shared with him were birthed and have died, I hoped to call home with him has become my prison, and all I want is to get as far away from here as I possibly can, but I can't.

So, I've decided that the only thing I can do for myself is make it so if I ever need to escape, I can get up and go.

A body healthy enough and strong enough to just go.

Enough money that I can always walk away.

I'm going to put our house - that was supposed to be our safe space, our sanctuary, where we were supposed to live together, love each other, and grow old together - up for sale. I have been told to have a certified property valuer check the value of the property before I list it, so I am crossing my fingers it is worth what I paid for it. How can it be that I'm listing it and we never even moved in?

All my life, I've begged men to love me.

All my life, I've begged them to try.

If it's really love, you don't even have to try.

I've given up on all those dreams.

I just want to get away from here. Pack my bags and run somewhere, but I can't.

Once upon a time, I believed that if I loved hard enough, if I put out as much love as possible into the world and other people, it would come back to me and surround me with the sort of love I have wanted so desperately that has often seemed to come so easily to other people, but never at all to me.

My love has never been enough,

I have never been....insert what you will.... enough.

Obele came into my life, and chipped away at the wall I'd built to defend myself from any more pain.

"I won't leave you." He said.

"You will have me no matter what."

I was scared to believe him. I didn't want to believe him, but repeat a lie enough times and it starts to sound like the truth.

And the lies that fell so, so easily from Obele's lips sounded too good to be true, but "Baby, trust me." he said, and light of my life that he had become, I stepped into his void on absolute faith.

It was hard, and it hurt, but we got through it.

"In twenty years," he said "we'll still be together, and closer than ever."

"I will never put another woman before you."

"Come here, let me put a baby in you."

Obele spoke about things I've always been afraid to even consider wanting, for fear of disappointment.

"We'll have a house." He said. "And it will be our home, you and me. Our safe space. Ours. To explore, and to enjoy each other, and to love each other."

And so, he promised me nights in our house.

In the house where we'd have forever with each other.

In the house where he'd always come home to me.

Where we'd blossom into a beautiful, happy family, drenched in our love for each other.

Nights, safe in each other's arms, at home, at peace.

He promised me nights filled with love in our house.

Nights filled with kisses, moans, gasps, and fingers digging too deep.

Nights full of tears followed by soft kisses.

Nights filled with him filling me, nights full of him, nights inside me.

Nights of love like I've waited so long to be real. Love like he's waited so long to feel.

Where are our nights now that you've burned our house down?