And suddenly, there we were again. Last Monday, a Brussels cafe. The day was done and we sat beside each other, just like we used to. Watching people, squeezing each other’s thigh, thinking about that sentence from Antoine de Saint-Exupéry: Aimer, ce n’est pas de regarder l’un l’autre, c’est regarder ensemble dans la même direction.

Yes, we often looked in the same direction. For six years. Committed to so much, astonished at even more, and sometimes simply content with the apple-carrot-ginger juice we made for each other on Sunday mornings.

And now, here we were again. After a three-month silence. She ordered port. Funny, she never used to do that. Everything had changed, yet still it seemed like old times.
Who are these people we once loved so much? The word “ex” doesn’t do justice to the intense, multilayered relations we’re left with from our former loves. The relationships with former lovers are perhaps the most enduring in our lives. The love went, the past remains, something along those lines.