She lay in bed flat on her back staring up at the ceiling as her tears fell freely down her cheeks and thoughts of everything that used to be went reeling through her mind. She wished now and then that she had the ability to freeze time in such a way that a single moment, or rather, a string of moments could live on forever. But she had come to know for herself that such a wish was exactly what it professed to be and would never be anything more than that. She was acquainted with the harshness of reality; Life gives and then it takes away, and sometimes what it takes away lives on within our hearts forever.

There is the happiness of the memories, the fondness of the joy, and the peace and comfort which comes from knowing a Love as real as this was something with which she was once acquainted, but there is also the pain that creeps up on her on nights like tonight to remind her just when she thinks she is finally okay, that some... thing.. some... piece of the very core of her heart yet remains missing, and that perhaps it always will.

This is a pain so plaguingly personal that even the tears rolling down her cheeks only communicate in some small portion the hurt that still remains. It is a loneliness so solitary that even though she wishes to with all her heart, she does not know how to share it with another. She reaches over to her night stand, cups her hand around her small, palm-sized digital alarm clock to check the time, curls up from her back onto her side, tears flowing even more freely than they were before, knees slighlty bent, head and shoulders slightly tucked in towards her body, and wonders to herself if her heart will ever heal. She winces in pain, curls her knees and head in closer to her body, takes a deep breath, wipes her tears away, and exhausted with emotion, finally finds sleep.