Him

The worst part for her were the signs.

The license plate with his name on it.

The bar sign with a portrait of a man that bore his striking resemblance.

The entire day where the ID number of the tickets at her workplace were his birthday, down to the year.

She tried to move on with her life, go back to before, but there was no denying the imprint that he had made. One that infected every part of her day, a hum that would not cease no matter how much she tried to focus.

Even if she wanted to see him, she had no way of finding him. He had only left the note. Ten words. Three lines.

I love you.

But we know

This will never work.

The parts that were bad for her but less worse than the signs:

1.) His kindness

2.) His playfulness

3.) The fact that he had told her he loved her

4.) The adoration in his eyes

5.) How they laughed together before they knew it would never work

She had read once that one of the major components of love was self-expansion. You fell in love with a person because they felt like an extension of you. So, really, the reason it hurt so much was because she had lost a part of herself when he left.

Or at least that's what she liked to tell herself when even with three glasses of wine she still felt the pain.