I knew when he came in. He hadn't made a sound but I knew anyway. Like part of me was missing, waiting, and would settle comfortably only when he was around.

     I smiled even though I didn't look up from the books spread out on the round oak kitchen table. The furnace had not yet conquered the morning chill of an Indian summer and I was glad for my brushed silk robe and fuzzy kitty slippers. The steam from my coffee wound its way toward my nose with delicious warmth. He slid his mug in the microwave with the tab from the tea bag dangling down the side. Earl Grey. He rooted around in the cupboard, finally extracting a cinnamon roll to match mine. It, too, went in the microwave as he added sugar to his tea and meticulously stirred it: twenty revolutions, lick the spoon and twenty revolutions more.

     He sat down in a chair away from the table with his tea and roll on the counter. "So, what are you studying this morning?' he asked as usual.

     I glanced up for the first time, "I finally got to something you enjoy - the Civil War. Maybe I should have studied you instead and I could have absorbed it by osmosis." He didn't seem to hear me, as if he had simply spoken out of habit and was now staring off into space. I shrugged my shoulders and rejoined Robert E. Lee.

     We chatted over insignificant daily matters, preparing ourselves for the day and week to come in our normal, comfortable banter. It allowed me to still keep half my mind on my books. Our conversation came and went amidst companionable, lengthy pauses. It had always been like this - neither of us had ever felt it necessary to fill every moment with talk.

     "I've been thinking about getting married . . .," he said into one of the pauses.

     "Anyone I know?" I asked in my regular, teasing tone. It had been kind of a game with us for a long time as first one and than the other of us had broached the subject of marriage. His silence arrested all of my attention and I looked up at him. Something about his pensive expression sent small shivers down my spine. The air was electrified. He turned his head slowly and looked straight at me. I saw no teasing crinkle lines, no smile.

     "Veronica, from work," he said quietly, "in a couple of weeks."

     I felt my self disintegrating beneath that steady gaze. My arms and legs were numb as they flew of into space. My insides were exploded to shreds as the blood drained from my face and I felt like I would throw up. I took a breath and wrapped my fingers tightly around my coffee mug, holding on to its stability as the room tilted and began to swirl around him. He would not release my eyes.

     My smile had been frozen so at least I hadn't humiliated myself further. "Lucky Veronica," I said in as normal a tone as I could manage, "why so sudden?"

     Finally he looked away, staring out the window as he answered, "It's not really all that sudden. I've sort of been seeing her for about eight months now and we kind of decided to fly down to Reno in a couple of weeks and get married."

     My world crumbled from me, leaving me on my chair with my books and coffee on a table where my arms rested and everything else rushed away to nothingness. There were no longer walls and a ceiling, no floor or sink or coffee maker. No stove or refrigerator. Only air and his face. I looked down at the table. Maybe if I looked away from him, he, too, would disappear. There was a ringing in my ears which obliterated all other sounds. I didn't even know if he was still talking.

     If I stood and stepped away from the table, would I fall into the void and disappear as the room had done? I picked up my cup as I stood, but I was supported by something - the floor, I suppose. I moved away in the direction of where there had once been a balcony and found myself standing at its rail. He followed and slipped his fingers around my waist, nuzzling the back of my neck.

     "Aren't you even going to tell me congratulations?"

     I thought of our years together. We had started simply as house mates but had rapidly become good friends. He was my best friend . . . he made me whole. It had seemed such a natural progression from there to the bedroom that I never questioned how it had happened. Sex was good with him. In fact, we shared nights of wild passion that would leave me breathless for a whole day just thinking about it. We didn't talk about love-making, it was just part of our life. A wondrous, fulfilling part.

     I could not absorb this. I felt like an island at the center of some unknown abyss. His lips on the back of my neck should have felt wonderful, like they belonged. My best friend. My lover. My self. What was I to him . . . where had I fit in the puzzle of who he was?

     "Come on," he said, "you're my best friend. At least wish me well."

     No, I couldn't be his best friend. What he was doing was incongruent with being best friends. So, who was I? What was I? I shuddered at the implication.

     "Hey," he said, trying to turn me around, "what gives?"

     I should be crying, but somehow there was no emotion. No feeling. Not even any pain - yet. I wondered if love and hate cancelled each other out. In fact, my whole world was nothing. As if what had come before was insignificant and the future was too hazy to see. I was alive in a void, but I was alive. I felt the blood coming back to my cheeks. The rail under my fingers became hard and real. There was a breeze blowing.

     "Take your hands off of me and go away," I said. "Now."

     A gentle drizzle began and I stood in the rain, soaking up something of reality. If the rain was real and I was standing in it getting wet, then I was real. And I could be strong. I'd make whatever decisions I had to make. I'd made my first one already. I had told him to leave.

     He was still talking, protesting my "attitude" but I didn't care. I wouldn't listen.

     "Now," I repeated, "leave now."

     He finally quit talking and left the balcony. I don't know how long I stood there, in the drizzle. Time seemed to be standing still, waiting for me to do something. Eventually I heard him struggling with the front door and heard the heavy bags he dragged over the threshold. The door closed with a solid, satisfying "thud." I was alone. I'd have the locks changed . . . tomorrow.

     I raised my face to the drops now pelting down fast and, surprisingly, warm. It was later than I had thought. I felt dirty and violated. I carefully loosened my sash with fingers which were regaining feeling and let my robe fall to the balcony as I kicked free of both the robe and my slippers. I stood there, naked and vulnerable, and let the rain wash everything away . . . the dirt, the betrayal, the warnings from friends which I had not heeded . . . even the tears.