She longs for his presence
To be able to hold him in her arms
One more time.
She'll never tell him how she feels
She longs to hear the sound of his voice
The way his hazel eyes brighten up when he talks
About something he loves.
How his smile can make her day
The way he isn't capable of doing simple tricks
Although he has been practicing long enough
She loves everything there is
To love about him

When he finally asks what’s wrong, tell him that he’s really just too good for you and you're afraid that one day he’ll wake up and realize that he could sleep with so many better women.
When he leaves the apartment and gets in the back of a taxi cab at two in the morning, don't follow him.
Maybe even though you saw him with another woman, laughing and joking in a smoky bar with their heads held close together, you still think you have a shot with him.
You don’t.

Dress yourself up if for no other reason than making yourself feel good. Put on your tightest, tiniest little black dress and some high heels and have a dance party in your own room with the stereo blasting.
Throw away his photos. Delete his texts, crumple up his notes and slot them into the paper shredder like old credit cards.
Thinking about him is dangerous; do not lie in bed in a quivering heap for days at a time. Do not mope or hit the snooze button simply so you can drift off to sleep and dream about him.
Jump in the shower and wash him out of your hair. Scrub your skin raw until you cannot smell him anymore. Wash your sheets. As you take them out of the dryer, practice saying your first and last name with adding his on.

Wreck your journal. This is the required “fresh start” your best friend told you about on New Years. She is tough and practical. Consider being more like her. Decide against it because having an affair with your husbands best friend is not practical.
Let your thoughts flow into questions that you pose to the world. Tell yourself that this is not an unfortunate habit.
Remind yourself that today in the modern world, if you’re single, that doesn't mean you’re missing “your other half.”  There isn't someone else out there running around with two arms and two legs and one head who used to be attached to one side of your body and will eventually find you again, on the street or in a deli or even at an indie rock concert in the back row; there’s just you. An imperfectly perfect human being who likes coffee or maybe hates it and has said awful, regrettable things to somebody else and is still trying to figure out how this whole life thing works.

When you are on the couch of your living room, do not reach out to squeeze the faces in the smoke you blow; do not think of his face. Reach out and draw the lines in your mothers face. She would have wanted you to.

Their sea foam apartment has soaked up the ashes that have hit their bedroom carpet, as well as the remnants of silent conversations passed between quiet lips. She found him in his Victorian chair that he had acquired from last year's flea market.

But staring. As if he wanted to mold into the inanimate walls, so that glares became passing glances, thoughts and feelings would strip into the air. The very fabrics of his mind would form to nothing - nothing significant. He mumbled heavy words towards the window, his view of family distorted under his parent's clumsy hands. She knew his hatred pulsed behind every memory of "family".

She thought, "but they grew older and so did we".

His eyes had never looked so dull. The reluctance in his face reminded her that she was tired. Not tired of her bed. But of this- blanket of clouded emotions. She herself collapsed next to him, freeing her dismantled wonders and collected pool of what used to be.

In a circle-the-drain sort of way, he said that it's killing him.

Killing you? I think killing both of us.
Hesitating, her voice broke the silence.

"Maybe that's our tragic flaw; we think too alike. If you're tired my love, then I feel the same."