I think I might have loved her the most not when she was chest to toe next to me, but the nights that followed right after those.
The next day, at four in the morning, when I would go to the bathroom in the middle of the night and come back to my bed being nothing but a mattress and still-fitted sheets, no one to lump under the covers, no one to kick them down for me, no sleepy paradox velcroed to my back while complaining about the gluey heat.
Those nights, I loved her the way only children, dogs, and I know how to: a bit desperately and with no civility, every reason why she wasn't there unreasonable, every door a door to wait by for her to walk through.