There had been countless times Sasha had gone to hold Tony's hand in the middle of the night, to call him after she'd received good news at work or to text him a funny video she knew would make him laugh.

It was no secret her life was different without him in it, and a lot darker to say the least. New York no longer held the same happiness it once did for Sasha. For a long time, it became a place that symbolised hope and a fresh start, though now, it had become the place that haunted her both in her dreams and when she was wide awake.

There was no street sign or corner that didn't remind her of Tony, no park bench they hadn't sat on together or bar they hadn't stumbled out of in the early hours of the morning. Sasha could hear his voice in the back of her mind when she looked in shop windows and when cars passed her in the street that were the same make and model he drove.

Men that wore old band t-shirts and red lensed glasses made her double-take in grocery store lines and women calling out his name always made her think she'd see her Tony appearing in front of her, only for it to be another woman's husband instead.

Sasha wasn't naïve. She never thought that leaving Tony was going to be easy, though she had drastically underestimated just how difficult it actually would be.

Having always been strong willed, Sasha had anticipated a couples of weeks worth of sadness, perhaps a few tears here and there, and a distraction in the form of throwing herself feverishly back into her job. Only, she couldn't have been more wrong.

The sadness hadn't lessened and the tears were free falling at all hours of the day and night. Her job provided no solace or distraction, acting as a reminder of all the times she would walk across the street at meet Tony in O'Shea's or call him as soon as she finished a press conference outside the courthouse. There was no way out of this endless tunnel of darkness that Sasha found herself in, the worst part being the fact that she'd walked into it on her own accord.

Tony had hurt her, deeply, though the reality of him not being around hurt her more. That being said, she'd seemingly made a bed of thorns and now had to lie in it, despite the crippling scratches and cuts that bled more every day.

Running through Central Park on a Saturday morning had become something of a routine for Tony, a way to force himself out of bed first thing on a weekend without spending hours laying in silence thinking about Sasha.

It had worked for the past few weeks, though on that particular morning, his distraction failed for the first time.

The temperature had dropped significantly and although the sun was shining in a bright blue sky, the air felt frosty and Tony could see his breath in front of him as he ran through the park, music blasting loudly through his headphones as he kept a steady pace.

He saw Sasha perched on an iron bench by the lake, one leg crossed over the other and a scarf draped around her neck, a cup of what he knew would be a black Americano in her left hand. Her hair was tied up in a curled ponytail and she was fresh faced besides a gloss on her lips and curled lashes, her skin pale yet glowing.

Tony stopped and stared for a few moments, panting as he caught his breath whilst also deciding whether to approach her or simply continue running like he hadn't seen her.

He almost felt his feet begin to move in the opposite direction when Sasha lifted her head from the ground and saw him, her eyes widening for a split second before a hesitant, soft smile fell onto her lips that grabbed Tony by the ankles and dragged him in her direction.

He swallowed hard as he walked towards her, his heart beating loudly in his ears and his stomach swirling with anxiety.

Sasha shuffled over, making room for Tony to sit down on the bench beside her. They were in a quiet spot in the park where only two people had walked past her since she'd sat down with her coffee twenty minutes earlier, a small slice of peace within a bustling metropolis.

"Hey, how are you?"

"Good," Sasha said with a nod, "Just uh, thought I'd come enjoy this place for the last time in a little while."

"You're leaving New York?"

Tony felt his heart drop. It had only been three days since he'd seen Sasha and another guy walking arm in arm down the street and ever since his talk with Bruce, he'd found a form of solace in hoping that fate would bring Sasha back to him in one way or another.

Sasha saw the hopelessness flash in Tony's eyes and the way his face fell from a keen smile to total devastation. Her insides had flared up upon catching Tony's eye, never thinking for a million years she'd bump into him on her last morning in the city, or perhaps ever again.

"Fresh start, again," she said with a dry chuckle, "I have a place in Maine, my firm is transferring me to their branch."

"Oh," was all Tony could manage to say, though even that came out in barely a whisper.

All the hope that had been instilled in him by Bruce's words had been slashed in an instant. Tony found comfort in believing that the universe wouldn't let a love as strong as he and Sasha's get lost forever, though it seemed like fate was only pushing them further apart, not closer together.

"What is it?" Sasha asked.

She watched Tony as he sat in contemplation for a few long moments. His brows were furrowed and his lips parted, as if he were about to say something if only his mind wasn't held back in chained restraints of thought.

"Nothing I just," Tony drew in a breath and looked back at Sasha, his eyes falling to the way her hand was tightly clutching her coffee, "I saw you a couple days ago, arm in arm with some guy."

It was Sasha's turn to look up in thought then, only to let out a sigh a few seconds later.

"Chuck," she nodded, "He drinks in O'Shea's, has done since I started going in there with Phil. We both started going in alone recently and naturally gravitated together. It's nothing, it could never be anything."

"Why not?" Tony asked instantly, his tone firm and inquisitive, so much so that it took Sasha by surprise.

"Because he doesn't like women, first of all. But second of all," Sasha paused and shook her head, "I'm not looking for love, I don't think I ever will again."

Tony scoffed, "Was I that bad, huh?"

Sasha let herself smile. She'd missed Tony's quick remarks and the way his smirk pulled to the side ever so slightly. He was sat beside her with his forearms resting on his thighs, his head tilted to look upwards at her with one eyes closed to shield his vision from the sun, a thick stubble across his jaw and a scattering of faint freckles across his nose that had faded in the colder months.

"You want the truth?"

"Always."

Sasha couldn't look at Tony as she prepared herself for what she was about to say. Instead, she turned her head away from him and stared out at the ducks in the pond ahead of her, listening to the way the breeze tickled the leaves that fell from their branches and blew ripples in the water.

"I don't want to look for love because I know I'll never find what we had in anybody else. I know now that the love we had, was the love I was meant to get in this lifetime. Nobody will ever come close to making me feel the way you do, and I don't want to waste my time looking for something that doesn't exist. You made me believe in something I didn't think I'd ever get to experience and I know that I'm not lucky enough to experience that feeling twice, so I've found peace in my choices and I know now that I'd rather be alone than with a man that isn't you."

Tony hadn't expected to hear Sasha reel off a monologue that sounded like it was from a romcom movie she'd pick to watch on a lazy Sunday morning. He hadn't prepared himself to hear Sasha tell him, again, that she still loved him in her own turn of phrase, nor had he prepared himself to know how to react if she ever did.

There was a thick silence between them that even the breeze obliged to, the entire park feeling as though it had ground to a halt as the two of them sat together on that bench, nothing but energy radiating between their two souls.

"S-so why are you leaving, Sasha? If you mean all of that, why aren't you letting me make you happy, why aren't you letting me love you?" Tony's voice was laced with desperation as he stared up at her, only her eyes remained fixed on the water, "Look at me, Sasha."

His demand turned her head and Sasha's watery eyes fell back to the man she loved. There was a bitter streak within Sasha that had always been there, a demonic voice in the back of her mind that reminded her she was better off alone, something that the universe had shown her by ripping away the people and things that she loved the most. Sasha had began to believe in the darkness that ran through her veins, so much so that the red she once bled, she was now convinced would be black if she suffered another cut.

"You hurt me, Tony. I'm better off alone, it's always been that way and you proved that to me, can't you see that?"

Tony knew he'd hurt Sasha but to hear her say the words out loud, even after the actions of their breakup and everything after it, still killed him inside, over and over again.

"I never wanted to hurt you, I never want to hurt you," he whispered, shaking his head with a softened gaze as he sat up straight and turned his body to face Sasha's, "What I did was stupid and irresponsible and I should've known better, but I can't change what happened even though I would give up everything to go back and do things differently if I could."

There hadn't been any measurement of time that had passed that Sasha hadn't been thinking about Tony. She thought about him in the morning and at night, when she cooked dinner alone and when she made her bed when she woke up. She thought him when she watched a TV show they used to watch together and when she walked past a gap in the coats on the wall where he used to hang his jacket.

It was impossible for Sasha to stop loving Tony, and not because everything in New York reminded her of him, but because she was deeply in love with him, and she knew she would be forever. It didn't hurt her to love him, but it did hurt her to have to live without him while feeling the way she did.

"I know nothing I say can make it better, but not everything in your life has to come to an end, Sash. I know it might feel that way because of your past and sometimes I feel like that too, but out of everything in my life, you are the one thing I've never wanted to give up on, not now, not ever. I'll love you in this life and in the next, and in every one after that. I've asked you for a lot since we first met, to trust me as a friend and as a partner, to let go of your fears and go into something blind. If I can ask you for one more thing, Sasha, just one, please, don't go to Maine."