Solitude

I was alone, and now I realized just how cold the world--against which her warmth had buffered me--had always been. Before, men had been expected to be urbane, and perhaps a bit handsome, if that was feasible--I always think of Fitzwilliam Darcy, somehow. But now we were expected to be a lot more, and at the same time a lot less. I wanted to be Kurt Cobain, Arnold Schwarzenegger, and Tom Cruise, all rolled into one. Instead, I was a wiry teenager who bore a strong resemblance to anemia, personified.