Marlon lives in a detached house a couple of streets away. He told me his family always have these giant Christmas parties with like a hundred people, and he wasn’t joking. The front door is open, people’s voices echo from every window, there are flashing lights coming from the living room, and I can tell the bass vibrations through my feet. It’s a wonder they haven’t been reported by their neighbors.

Since this is our second Christmas as a couple, I was going to drop in for an hour in the evening anyway once most of my relatives had entered a wine-induced slumber, but now here I am at only 4pm.

Ben Meier

(16:02) I’m outside! xxxx

I stand and wait on their doorstep. Just walking into the house would probably awkward, and I doubt anyone would hear the doorbell if I tried to ring it. Luckily, Marlon quickly appears at the doorway.

He looks at me for a couple of seconds, and then folds his arms. ‘You didn’t bring an umbrella?’

I glance up at the sky. I hadn’t even noticed it was raining, but when I look down at myself, I realise that my clothes are completely soaked.

‘Oh,’ I say, and look back at him.

‘Hey,’ he says with a grin.

Since me and Marlon got together two years ago, a lot of shit has gone down. But despite it all – the ED voice getting louder in the summer, the self-harm relapse in the autumn – Marlon has stuck by me and tried to support me however he can.

At first, I was scared to tell him about all of my mental health stuff. I thought he might not want to date me any more if he knew. But, in actual fact, opening up about that stuff made us stronger as a couple.

I know a lot of people think relationships don’t last, or they not as ‘deep’ as other relationships, but me and Marlon? I think we’ve got something different.

Something great.

‘Hi,’ I say and step inside.

He shuts the door and turns to face me, his grin gone. He brushes some of my drenched hair out of my eyes. ‘You look like shit, Ben.’

I let my forehead fall on to his shoulder. ‘Yup.’ His arms wrap around me instantly and I lift mine to hold him too, and he rests his head against mine and his hair brushes my ear and he pulls me against him.

We stay like that, in the cold porch, just for a few minutes, without saying anything, without moving, and then he whispers, ‘You okay?’ and I start cry, because that’s always what happens when people ask me that questions. I really don’t want him to see me cry, because there’s been far too much of that recently and it’s Christmas Day, so I try extremely hard not to move from his shoulder, but that doesn’t stop him seeing. When he pulls back, the tears are streaming down my face.

‘Sorry, I just…just had an argument with my adoption mum,’ I say, trying to sound fine but obviously not succeeding.