It was yet another evening out on the tiles with Tea, her arm linked in mine as she turned in that spangely wisp of material Mr.Dolce and Mr.Gabbana ripped up and sold for thousands under the impression it was a dress. It’s what she’s paid to do though, wear dresses and outfits that the ordinary housewife would never even see the shop window of, let alone buy and wear with pride, on the red carpet-desperately clutching their most ideal famous partners hand. She’s wear a boiler suit if she was paid and jetted off to an exotic location, how she latched onto me, I’ll never know. I still think there was nothing wrong with shell suits, so it just goes too show how little about her profession I really knew about. I’d tried my best, been the doting boyfriend that I am, I put up with her strange and bizarre eating regimes and her stomach crunches on the floor of our rented apartment at 4 in the morning because she’d quench the digestive flow better. She returned the favour, putting up with me being away for weeks and months at a time, doing the job that I understood best and could safely call my own, Tea-free luxury (and I could wear what the hell I liked).

We fell in love in South America, she was modelling swimwear on a beach we were lazing on, in between dates for our latest tour, promoting and endless line of songs on he album as well as the old favourites to anyone able to get a ticket. It was Zac that noticed her first, being the oaf that he is he cat-called her and wolf whistled like a slobbering dog as she sauntered by where we were laying. She had perfect skin and perfect body and pretty wasn’t word enough for her features-but as watched her stick her middle finger up at Zac with her free hand resting on her hip defensively, I realized that she was nothing but a bulimia worshipping goddess who modelled ‘clothes’ by day and partied by night. She shifted her gaze to me and smiled, adding and extra finger up before she flounced up feeling mightily proud with herself. But she got more than she bargained for when I bumped into her at the beach bar an hour later when I pressed her for an apology for the insult towards me. Sad, but it got her talking to me and I realized how wrong I was to judge her on her job and typical modal stereo-typicalities. She’d started a medical degree at Harvard little under a year ago but left it for modelling when three scouts spotted her at once during a benefit bash that some old moneybags threw. She knew who I was, she actually said she respected us and wasn’t ashamed to own up to possessing all of our music. Tea Deacon was very honest and very up front and for a woman in such an unstable and bitchy career, she seemed level headed, in control of her own ship and most defiantly a girl who took no bull crap. And so the rest goes-we got to know each other, we fell in love and then we got comfortable, moved in together and supported each other through the media up’s and down’s that quickly dogged our blossoming relationship.

It’s been two years now and we’ve had our share of rough patches, so much so she’d called a rain check on the relationship-much to my aching heart. As competition in both our careers escalated to dizzying heights, things got strained as we tried to load more onto the relationship bandwagon than it could carry safely. She was into networking, to making friends with Heath and Heather and other star-struck couples who’s on screen chemistry had gotten a little too wild for the film set. I knew Tea wanted more in her life, she wanted a movie career, she wanted a seven bed roomed mansion in Beverly Hills, and I just wanted a quiet night in with, her head resting in my lap as I played with her hair and plaited it into tiny braids only mice could see. I need romance to live and function, I love to give and I bathe in the feeling of happiness I can bring someone with one small gesture. A lot of that loving feeling was bestowed upon Tea from day one of our relationship, we made love on a bed scattered with rose petals and a red rose was delivered to the shoot she was on, the following day. We were full or every feeling for each other but now as the world turns fierce and roars in our faces for more, more songs, more summer collections-the relationship had to remain active, but also do a major downsize (much against my hearts desires).

I did it because I love her, I crushed my heart into a tight little box, only bringing it out when we bother were in the same room of the same time zone, in the same country to show her how swollen with love and tenderness it was, just for her. I lived, it never did hurt anyone to try something new, but when Tea first rain checked our relationship early last year to ‘find her direction’, I’ve felt like my heart’s still in it’s box, cooped up and unable to breath-but I love her, I can’t loose her, so I grin and bear it and hold her hand and pose as eye candy so she can advance her life further more.

’Isaac, did you have a good time tonight?’ she asked me sweetly, rolling over in bed as I lay away from her on my side, much like every night because to look at her would only make my insides ache more. I felt her hand rubbing the tired flesh on my hip, her hand dipping below the crisp white sheet to graze my navel. She often touched me, not realizing how much it made my heart swell even more and my body flinch as if I just wanted to grab her, impale her and moan her name over and over again. ‘Isaac? Are you asleep?’ she whispered in my ear, the tantalizing sensation of her breath on my ear made me realize that it was all getting a heavy load to bear for me, the romantic boy from the south who needed to know he was loved back every day of his crazy life. ‘Isaac answer me, I know your awake,’ she sternly warned, her fingers pinching my hip lightly, causing me to turn round on my back quickly, looking up at her in that pure white silk nighty she’d got given as a gift from one randy designer only weeks ago. It was the type of garment that gave me wicked fantasies, the type of garment that sent me to the brink of insanity with its pureness. ‘There’s no need to pinch me Tea, I was half asleep actually,’ I replied with an annoyed look, rubbing the sore skin where her nails had pinched me awake. She was like that, pinching, playfully pushing me playfully kicking me-except she wasn’t playful in her force at all. ‘Anyway, I don’t know about you but I think that was well worth going too-I got a few cards and numbers, it’s all adding up,’ she shrugged excitedly, running a hand through her artificially curly raven hair. She looked innocently, awaiting for me to fill in the doting boyfriend line of ‘oh that’s nice dear’Instead I looked at her, totally oblivious as to how much it was hurting me, cooping up my love for her not being able to show it, prove it and let her writhe in pleasure at the feel of it. ‘Why don’t we ever have sex anymore? Why won’t you show me affection in public?’ I sat up looking at her, awaiting her to come out with a sensical answer, or for her to push her lips against mine and prove me I was just being paranoid about holding my love in and not being able to express it. Instead she scoffed and looked at me with her Latino eyes, her deep brown almond eyes that intoxicated me on that first night together. ‘Isaac stop being so stupid, we have sex all the time and just because I won’t let you grope me at public events is pretty much self explanatory,’ she waffled, her expression looking as if she was my 9th grade teacher and I’d just asked her what letter came first in the alphabet. ‘No Tea, we don’t-it’s been months you’ve stopped letting me love you, your always pre-occupied and I just care about you too much to keep these feelings all cooped up and too myself,’ My stern tone caused her to look at me with evil eyes, her concern only laying with herself as she shuffled away from me. ‘Isaac we both work hard, when we do see each other we tend to go out and be a couple- it can’t be sex, sex, sex all the time it’s just part of being in a working relationship,’ she snarled, narrowing her gaze down at me as I just sighed at another attempt for her to hear me, went awry. ‘We don’t HAVE to go out, I’m quite happy staying in with you, in fact some nights I prefer it but I go out because it means so much to you,’ I retaliated, sitting up a bit against the headboard, looking at her simply. ‘Well aren’t you the martyr? I could quite easily find another man willing to escort me,’ I could feel her claws digging into me already, but I never liked to fight with her, I was a lover not a hater and sometimes I think she forgot that. Sighing I thought it best to bring in the damage control before it was too late. I reached over to try and take her long slender hand in mine, as I tried to at least touch her, smooth her skin sensitively so she knew that I did want to be with her, despite of the media spotlight being a major part of our relationship.

‘Don’t touch me,’ she whispered, jerking her hand away as she looked away from me and I looked at her in shock. ‘What? Tea come on, you know I want to be with you, I go out because I’m with you and it makes you happy and you know that’s paramount to me,’ the romantic patter churned out of me like rapid DJ talk, but it was true. I might be tired, jet lagged and missing the feeling of intimacy between us- but I still love her deeply, even if right now she has a heavy load on her mind and that feeling isn’t returned as strongly. It has before and it will again. ‘Isaac, just.. just go too sleep,’ she hushed before burrowing down under the covers with her back too me. I watched her back rise sharply as she huffed and settled down and I immediately knew she was still cross with me, yet I’m still unsure why. I leaned over her and looked at her face, eyes squeezed tightly shut as she tried to get rest. I raised my hand and pushed her hair over her shoulder so it cascaded down her back and let my hand graze the bronzed skin of her shoulder. Noticing she’d not told me to leave her alone, I lowered my lips to the tender flesh and kissed it gently and let my hand slid down her arm, and under the covers to rest on her hips. She squirmed a little and her eyes flew open just as I sucked lightly at the soft skin beneath her ear. Her hands were soon on my shoulders, pushing me onto my back on my side of the bed. ‘Didn’t you hear me? I said go to sleep,’ her tone was threatening, her eyes full of anger as she pinned my shoulders too the bed as she warned me. I just nodded, sighing inside that yet again she’d pushed me away, the stresses of the relationship and her work always tipping the scales in favour of work, or so it seems. She pushed my shoulders once more spitefully before turning back over and settling back down to sleep.

If I didn’t live for the times she showered me in affection, kissed me stupid when she’d met another hot-shot who was making idle promises to boost her career, when she linked her arm in mine when she introduced us as a couple to designers, modals and casting directors- I’d have made myself see she didn’t love me anymore. But it’s the little things that she does that makes it all worth while, and no matter how long I have to wait to let my heart out of it’s cage-I’ll wait. I guess right now though I’ll just have to chalk it down to another rough patch, won’t I?