I expected you to ask me, if I wanted to come to bed. I didn’t feel disappointment when you didn’t.

“…ok… well, I’m headed to bed.”

The automated words came out of me, as hollow as a door greeter at some retail store, “ok. Goodnight.”

We looked into each others eyes for a moment mechanically. And then you turned and your footsteps receded.

I thought to myself: I am the hole in your heart. I am not your future. I never was. I’m not the whole, I’m just parts. And if I ever asked you to marry me, I know you’d say no. And I also knew that I would never ask.

I glided my hand across the fabric of the couch we picked out together. The furniture was paid off a few weeks ago. I studied the dog bite marks in the wood of the coffee table from where I sat. Teething. You thought what if he hated you. I reassured you he was just a puppy.