A story for Sunday | River Rock

When we talk about when to tell the kids, we talk more than we have in many months. I have had too much wine; I have spilt it twice and you are looking at me like you are thinking Well, this is exactly why I must go. I am trying to think of reasons you mustn't, but I cannot think of any that will convince you to stay. You are already gone. You have been gone for many months. Everything we do now is only formality.

Later, in bed, we lay together. You suggested sleeping on the couch, said it would be better to start getting used to the way things are. Are. Suddenly I am in the present. In this present tense, I am begging you not yet, not yet and you are relenting. I have a thought while brushing my teeth, maybe on other things he will relent. It is a harmful thought; I squash it as soon as it blooms. I must. We are in the present tense, separately. Our realities have diverged like Frost's old poem. How does it go? I ask in the dark. The present is always moving forward, hopping along from river rock to river rock until it slips and it has crashed into the shallow, cold water.

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A Story for Sunday is my weekly commitment to writing fiction, whatever length, for better or worse.