No Winner. No Loser.

The moment...Obviously, I've spent some time thinking about the moment, the moment of that first meeting/sighting of my ex. And yes, a few weeks ago at the gym I actually wished it would happen after having achieved the perfect, never thought possible without the help of a makeup crew, sweaty hotness where my skin was glowing with fresh dew and my hair was just messy enough that it begged to be messed up some more by an indiscreet romp at the nearest acceptable or unacceptable location.

I hoped this would be the moment. Not as I had originally planned, looking my best with my just stepped out of a salon hair, the right coat and sunglasses on and my new and improved boyfriend by my side....No. Not like that but alone, strong and capable and dripping in sweat, releasing irresistible pheromones into the atmosphere that no man could ignore.

A few days later, back at the gym, as I walked up my man made hill of 10.0, I was looking out the window - the window with a clear view of his front door and wondered. I wondered what that meeting would really be like if he walked out and saw me. Would he wave? Would I? I'd probably pretend not to have seen him and try, with all the concentration I could gather at a moment like that (barely any), to focus on the rotating information on my treadmill display while thinking, “don't look at the window, don't look at the window”, until...I couldn't stand not looking anymore. By that time I'd probably see his back turning the corner only to be followed by the swinging of his arm as it held on to the briefcase I got him for Christmas last year.

If the encounter were more face to face, in the gym, would we speak? I can't say for sure but I think that we'd just acknowledge each other with a perfunctory nod followed by a reluctant and surely uncomfortable smile and that would be that. I hung on that thought until it became devastatingly clear that all the moments I had imagined are probably much better than the moment will actually be...I proved myself right.

It happened. The moment happened. The moment where I saw my ex and where, I think, he saw me. I was on the subway platform waiting for the train when, out of the corner of my eye, I saw a form walking briskly in my direction with a hurried purpose about him. Only one person I know rushes to get to the end of a platform of a train that's not even close to arriving. That just happens to be his way- being in a perpetual state of late for something.

"I know that body language," I thought to myself. I stole a glance to be sure and...sure enough, there he was. Instinctively, my head turned towards the other direction. This wasn't how I had planned it. The veritably unnoticeable bump (I can't even call it a pimple) left of center of my eyebrows that had formed the night before, had been freshly picked at a few moments prior under the magnifying mirrors and bright lights at Sephora. It had become what looked like a now noticeably misplaced Bindi which I did successfully cover up but still... I knew it was there.

“Don't look at him. DON'T look at him," I said to myself with all the concentration I could gather at a moment like that- even less than barely any. How could I not though? As surreptitiously as possible, I stole another and as he passed behind the stairwell that separates the B and D trains from the F and the V, he saw me. Though our eyes never actually met, I know he did. I felt it. Then, just like that, the moment was gone; as ephemeral as love itself.

It's an odd unsettling feeling to have just noticed someone you loved...still love in some small recess of your heart though you have no good reason to, and pretend that he never existed. Even odder? To believe that the man, who just a few short months ago was asking you to move in and telling you you're the one, has just done the same, whether he still loves you or not.

The moment I had been waiting for...over in an instant. So much less satisfying than I could have ever imagined and more painful than the ones I envisioned where we actually say hello or with the new girlfriend I've created for him in my mind hanging on his arm.

No winner. No loser. Just a moment.