A Short Story

Sometimes I am inspired to write. It can be overwhelming. Like being taken by an uncontrollable beast, and it is an exhilarating feeling. It can even wake me up in the middle of the night. And I know I must write now!

My goal is to write stories that make you to feel the rain on your skin and smell the ozone filled water, on the leaves of the trees around you.

This story is one that came to me all at once. It doesn’t have a name.

---

She was standing on the threshold of a new life. She could feel it calling to her, urging her on, small, gentle hands pulling at her softly, tugging at her gown and her fingers, hurrying her along. Her new life was an impatient child.

She closed her eyes and imagined herself standing in a doorway, a hand on either side of the door jam, holding herself back from taking that final step through the door. She looked back at the life she was going to rid herself of and knew that she was finished there

Her life had not really gone the way she had planned. But nothing ever did. After so many faded plans, holidays not taken (husband too busy), trips to the zoo (husband playing golf) and days at the park (football on the telly) that had all ended like autumn leaves carried away in the desolate wind, she had learned that lesson.

She had married well, she thought, a man that made her smile, and filled her heart with a desire to make him happy. Unfortunately he didn’t feel the same. Maybe he had at the beginning, but not now. They had done what they were supposed to do; they got married, had a couple of kids and started to live their lives. She had given up everything to him and he had taken it, with nothing given in return except financial security, his children to raise and dirty laundry.

Then one day she woke up and realised that she wasn’t living, she was dying very, very slowly. She was 36, had two nearly-teenage kids, whose hands it seemed had long ago slipped away from her, but nothing else. Her husband had his hobbies, friends and sports. He didn’t seem to notice her fading existence. She had dedicated her life to her family and now they were almost gone. She had never felt so alone or so invisible.

She suspected that the only way they would notice her absence was if they no longer had clean clothes in their drawers or food on the table. She had even tested it one day. She came home very late in the evening – she had planned to say she had run into an old friend and they had lost track of time chatting. She had even fantasised their talk; catching up on old times, laughter over their shared joys and sorrows of raising children and anxious plans to meet again, plans they knew they wouldn’t keep. It was such a beautiful fantasy to have sitting in the transport cafe off the motorway. Slowly sipping coffee. Alone.

When she had arrived home it was to a dark and forsaken house. A note on the refrigerator said simply “At pub. Kids at friends. Don’t wait.” He hadn’t even rung her mobile. No one wanted to know where she was. Her fantasy of meeting an old friend swum in front of her eyes, her tears blurring and distorting the imagined image of that stolen coffee.

She began her descent that night, alone in the kitchen. It started with a stomach ache that wasn’t gone after a few days. She visited the doctor but he was unimpressed. Gastroenteritis was all he said after a few cursory questions and dismissed her with a backhanded wave. She had no will or desire to demand the attention she should receive.

A few weeks passed and the stomach ache became nausea then stomach cramps but she didn’t seek help again. She knew it was her ravaged soul dying, leaving her and her body deserted. It would be just her, alone, living a deforested, soulless existence.

Her life continued as it had before; rising to make breakfast and lunches, accepting a perfunctory kiss on the cheek as her husband rushed to work, urging her children to school. Then, as always, the housework but now in the silence of the house she was alone in her bleak, unfurnished body and it was agony. When the children came home from school she would quietly listen to their many excited stories as they rushed to do homework and then out to play. She no longer saw the beauty of this simple, elegant exchange or understood what a vital part she was playing in their lives.

She could see it now. She could see it so clearly. She saw what she had allowed to happen. She could see that it had been her expectation to be filled by these things, for it to be enough, that it would do the job for her. She didn’t do any work on herself. She lost what should have been the most important thing. Her.

It was easy to see from the comfort of a hospital bed, simple to judge herself from the knowledgeable position of the future. Her attempted suicide had been more than a cry for help. It was from a desperate need to join her soul in abandoning her vacuous body.

Her husband had been holding her hand when she awoke. Crying warm, syrupy tears on her and begging her to forgive him for not noticing how despondent she must have been. The joy he showed, that he genuinely felt when she was back with him roused her soul. It stirred and she felt her fire again. She realised then that it had never left her. The first hugs from her children tasted honeyed, sweet and delicious. Her family was whole again and she felt healed. She and her husband found each other again and he vowed they would never lose her again. She silently agreed she would fight this time.

While in the hospital the doctors had found stomach cancer. It was very advanced. She never sought treatment. Now she would die anyway. She had wallowed in the love and joy of her family for the past months. And with the time she had left she was enjoying everything her family willingly gave and giving everything she had. Seeing their beauty every day. Feeling their full love at every moment. Joyously revelling in their ambrosial presence with every second. This last stolen year of love, mirth, pleasure and happiness had been rapture.

The pain was now too much to bear. And she found herself in the position, again, of wanting to die. But this time with joy in her soul. With love in her heart. With salty tears of bitter-sweet contentment, in her eyes. She would wish them all one last goodbye every night, before every nap, with every smile and laugh. She would die soon.

And there she stood on the threshold of a new life. Waiting.