He sat up, breathing hard, the hard edge of the couch digging into his back. He ran a hand over his face, trying to erase the memory. He could hear her voice once again, floating through his mind. He hated waking like this.

It happened often...ever since the time they'd said goodbye. They'd drifted. It'd been too hard to keep things up anymore. She had needed confidence, and he had no way to give her any. He had no way to reach her. Oh, he had tried....and he knew she had tried all the same things. The world proved to be too much for them. She no longer was a welcoming, breathtaking vision in a dream anymore. He couldn't stare into her beautiful eyes, or hear her musical laughter, or study her hands as he held them in his own. She no longer walked through his mind. She had left tracks on his heart.

Some nights, it was impossible for him to forget her. Sometimes, he went out on the town, for a movie or to a bar with his friends, and sometimes a night would go by...a week or two...without her crossing his mind. Then, subconsciously, he would yearn for that reassurance, for that patience and undying love, and it would all come back to haunt him.

Her voice was coming back to him as he sat there on the couch, the moonlight streaming across his body, reflecting on his glasses. Words she had spoken to him on their last night together.

* I need to apologize to you. I haven't touched you as you have touched me. I have thought about touching you, but it is hard. I have lied to you, and hurt you. I am sorry. You may think that I am a really nice person; you may think that I am mean. I am both. You deserve, however, only the nice things. Encourage me to make you feel better. Encourage me to love you more. I do love you; if you do not feel it, feel it now. *

What had she been trying to say? Her voice was so soft, dripping with tears and shame. He could feel her hands covering his own, holding them, stroking them...memorizing them. He heard his breathless, confused, "What are you saying?"

"I'm trying to tell you that I love you more than my life. You are my life. You've always been my reason for waking up in the morning and going to bed at night. You're the one who's left me with goosebumps, with tears, with laughter...with feelings I am never going to forget my entire life. But if you can't feel it too, then I can't go on living this way."

Then he'd seen it...the glint of something in her hand. It had suddenly appeared out of nowhere. She wasn't standing beside him anymore. She wasn't touching him. She was backing away, holding the knife in her hand, moving it closer and closer to herself...

"What can I do? What do I say to someone who's haunted my dreams...someone I married? What am I supposed to do for you, yearning for you every night, dreaming of you every damn free second of the day I've got? If you can't go on...if you're a mess...than so am I. And I deserve the knife too."

"All I ask is that you love me," she whispered. "That's all I ever needed from you. Love."

Then he'd woken. The cryptic message would haunt him for years, and her face would still ring through his mind. But he was helpless...helpless without her.

He wanted to make it up to her. He felt he should. He needed her to go on making people laugh. She kept him sane. His hands shook as he dialed her number. "Hello?" her voice whispered. "Jen...it's me."

**words sent to me by my fanfic group