If there's one thing I can't take, it's the sound that a woman makes about five seconds after her heart begins to break.

He had just gotten out of a long relationship, still reeling from the fiance who had left him a few years earlier; a serial monogamist at it's finest.

I was in the midst of being single for the longest period of my adult life. Still not quite sure what being an adult in an adult relationship was all about and holding on to the last of my insecurities with all my might.

It was doomed from the beginning.

Our first date culminated in our first kiss, which brought me to my knees and left me unable to be anywhere but his side for as long we were together.

There was no dating, no courting-we had a date, then we were official and, soon thereafter, deeply, terrifyingly in love.

We broke up for the first time and I begged for another chance. Not sure why, but it felt like the right thing to do at the time.

It worked. And as we both cried and hugged and made up, he kissed me.

"Surely, you can feel I love you when we kiss," he prompted.

I nodded, but it was a lie. Whatever passion I had previously felt had vanished-we had an expiration date, and we both knew it.

It was cyclical-we fought, we made up, we argued, we worked things out. I was usually the one who backed down, he won the fights and I nodded in agreement, holding back for the sake of the relationship, no matter how doomed it was. Yet still, every fight we had killed me-rendering me a useless mass on my couch.

But out last fight was different. I stuck up for myself-I knew it was the end and it going to be on my terms. I drove across town, my top heavy Jeep swerving precariously in and out of traffic, heart racing, palms sweaty.

We tried to make up one last time-dinner and movie were our band-aid for a relationship broken beyond repair. It didn't work and I stormed out of his house for the last time.

Even though I knew it was coming, even though I knew it was doomed from the beginning, my heart ached. I laid on my mothers couch for days, willing my heart to catch up to the feelings my mind had known for far too long.

This post is in response to a prompt at Write on Edge-Doomed Relationships.