The smell of coffee hit my face, just as it always has. I lifted my head and made eye contact with the barista. It’s Wednesday, and it’s 2:30. Kate’s on shift, just as she always has. She gives me a kind smile as I walk up to the counter, my feet dragging.

“Haven’t seen you in a while,” she notes softly as she grabs a grande sized cup, just as she always has. But this time, she doesn’t grab two.

“Life happens.” I say curtly, my voice strong and quiet, just as it never has.

“Yeah, it happens. Haven’t seen you since-” Kate begins, but my eyes dart to her, and my expression shuts her sentence down. She dips her head down as she loads hot coffee into my cup, but this time, she doesn’t have to pour two. “Strange without her, huh?”

I exhale sharply. “Don’t I know it.”

“Three months on Saturday?”

I nod. She stares at the counter as she pours 2% milk into my cup, then two shots of espresso. I slide the exact amount to her as I take my coffee and leave a dollar in the tip jar, just as I always have. I walk off without another word.

I sit at my regular table and look out the window. Yet when I look back across the table to the seat on the other side, it’s not occupied with a short, sassy girl with the curliest of blonde hair. She isn’t laughing at my disheveled bedhead, and she definitely isn’t smiling at me when I tell her she looks beautiful, just as she always had. No, the silent air that’s replaced her isn’t beautiful. It’s like an invisible devil, curled up where she used to be. Making himself comfortable. Finding amusement in my torture.

I’ll never love another girl again. Not after the six year affair I had with the love of my life. She was so charming and mature beyond her years. She’d already been interested in politics. She would’ve been a great politician. She was an excellent debater; she was the kind of person you’d want arguing for you, not against you.

She was beautiful, brilliant, talented, and hilarious. She had so much going for her.

But in the end, I suppose I knew she would slip through my fingers and fall into the pill bottle. Her gorgeous soul could only delay the inevitable. It won, after a fight she put up for eight years. After all that fighting, it just ended up like this.

She’ll never be back to tease me for being fidgety around birds. She’ll never be back to be the one to carry a leash and dog treats in her car in case she ever came across a stray. She’ll never be back so I can kiss her forehead and rub her wrist. The empty air across from me is here, and that’s all that ever will be.

Maybe, just maybe, I’ll leave an emptiness too, in this chair, so our silence can be together.

Perhaps I just need to be with her again.

I stand up from my seat and throw my coffee away. I hadn’t even taken a sip.

I walk out of the coffee shop, and the cold air hits my face, just as it always has.

I take a deep breath, and walk to my car alone, just as I never have.