It didn't always hurt the same. It hurt differently, in various places, for numerous reasons.
And no, it wasn't her fault for sneaking glances at him, or waiting at corners to catch him crossing by, or perhaps wishing that one day her sentiments might be returned in the slightest.
He was inevitable, he was destined. His place in her heart and mind had been written in the stars, in some eternal storybook which held the tale of her life.
It was a dull ache if anything, and in the most extraordinary of cases it came with a pang of excitement.
If anything, she was led towards her fanaa-her self destruction. And he was just a means to the end of her soul.
As for him, he like most on the receiving end never knew the gift waiting for his recognition. This gift of unconditional acceptance. Of this cliche, fairytale romance.
He was oblivious, he was the villain. He couldn't read her eyes, and he never tried to because he was too busy masking the pain in his own.
It was his insecurities and sadness that accompanied him like an old friend as he traveled the patchwork quilt of his life.
He was art: to be admired and never touched.
He was far away.
He was ethereal.
Yet, she was plain.
And her face blended with the others civilians on a busy street.
It didn't beg a second look.
Sometime she felt like he could see right through her into the next person.
That's what she meant to him.
A face in a sea of faces.