"I think I'm in love."
"How do you know?"
"I feel terrible."
-- from "Nadja," a very stupid movie

It's funny how that missing part of you shows up at the weirdest times and places. In the passenger seat of my brother's car last night, I looked out the window and watched the #27 bus drive by. And suddenly I longed so badly to be on that bus, listening to some really great music, and having her at my side. She wasn't anyone in particular, just the mysterious someone who I plan to find someday.

Call me old fashioned, but I believe in destiny, or at least in a destined sort of love. Maybe it's just a self defense mechanism for me, to comfort myself when I think back on how long I've been lonely and how no one's ever come along to save me from it. I just keep telling myself she's out there, just one girl, and if I wait long enough someday when I'm least expecting it I'll look up and say, "It's you."

Even though I don't know who she is or anything about her, what she looks like, what her name is, what she'll be like at all, I still think I can feel her sometimes. One morning a year or two ago I remember waking up with the weird sensation that I was two people. When I sat up I could feel the two struggling to keep up with eachother, sort of swaying back and forth within me. When I moved it was like a ghost effect, with these two souls overlapping eachother, two hearts not beating as one but trying to. I'd never felt so beautiful in my life. For an hour or two all that emptiness was filled up with the other person in my body. Eventually it wore off, but I never forgot it.

A couple of nights ago I had a dream I was her. I knew I wasn't myself because I hugged a monkey, and thought it was cute. I hate monkeys. When I woke up there was this moment of pleasant confusion, where I wondered where I was, who I was. I couldn't remember if I was her or me, my own bedroom was foreign but familiar at the same time. Where did I end and she begin? Which side was I on, which one of us? I laid as still as I could, trying to trap that moment forever, but eventually someone (I think my brother) called my name and I remembered that it was me, just me, still alone, still without her. I wanted so badly to remember what it was like to be her, but I couldn't.

And then there's moments like this morning, when you wake up and she's not there, and you feel it so strongly that it's almost unbearable. You lay there and your whole body aches, feeling all of those places where she's missing. It starts at the heart, where there's a huge hole where her love is supposed to be. Then it spreads, the place on your belly where her hand should be resting, your sides that should be encased in her arms, your ear which should hear her voice, feel her breath, whispering into it, your lips that hers should be touching. Your whole skin hurts with the places her skin should be. And you don't cry, because there's no point in crying if she's not there to kiss the tears away. Eventually it spreads beyond even the body, you look around your room and you notice empty places where she's supposed to be, the empty chair where she should be sitting, the corner of the room that she should be standing in, the table that her belongings should be strewn across. Where is she, and why isn't she filling this room with her body, her voice, her presence? Why is there a girl shaped empty space leaning over me right now?

I think maybe my heart's finally melting a little again, showing a little pink through all that blue ice. I think maybe for the first time in a very long time I'm in love. It's not a sure thing, but I feel it spreading slowly through me. And it's just as hopeless as every time before, but maybe, just maybe this time she's the one.

Whether or not it's this particular girl, some day I will find her. Someday I'm going to see an empty space that's shaped just like me, and I'm going to step in it, right at its owner's side, and she's gonna say, "It's you."