sparkle-free zone

I guess if I'd thought about it, perhaps I would have known it was over. I described it to people as suddenly realizing I had fallen out of love but that may be a bit of a stretch ...

But the sparkle died. I had always felt a little inexplicable sparkle around him, since the day we'd met and now it's gone. True - we don't see each other often. His life has changed in some pretty big ways (my life as well). But even with the gaps the sparkle had always been there, below the surface, resurrected each time I saw him.

But it's gone. Replaced with a not unpleasant feeling of comfortable friendship mixed with just a bit of distance. An interesting transition that I was completely unaware of until it had finished.