8 – It's you #LoveStoryChallenge

They had, by May, exchanged eighteen letters but were having trouble holding a physical conversation each time they met at church. They would walk past each other, exchanging pleasantries and darting away, as though they were strangers. But by now he knew what her favourite colour was (and it wasn’t purple – so he had started putting the letters in lilac envelopes instead, a lighter shade of purple); he knew the names of her three sisters; he knew her father had died when she was 9; he knew she was from the island of Bonny in Rivers state; he knew she was scared out of her mind that she wouldn’t finish with the second class upper she so desperately needed. She had also come to know him inside and out; she knew his mother was in a nursing home in London; she knew he had a half-brother who worked at Citi Bank and had broken all ties with him; she knew he was turning 28 on November 10^th; she knew he had learnt plumbing at HMP Barlinnie and was contracted to Stonebridge Apartments from a small maintenance company called Middle Hub; she knew he shared a room at the men’s home with a man named Paul, who had served twenty years for man-slaughter, had eyes that danced each time he laughed, and suffered from clinical depression. They knew so much about each other, but couldn’t – or wouldn’t – talk to each other; wouldn’t hold an audible conversation because each was scared that they might be making up how evidently in love they were.