No More

I haven’t moved since I got the call.  My hands shake but I will not cry.  I bite my lower lip.  I will not cry.

The fact that he’s coming to see me can mean only one thing.  My husband’s not coming home.

No more mornings when he brings me breakfast in bed.  No more making love in the pool under a star filled sky.  No more surprise bouquets.  No more hidden notes just to tell me he cares.

I knew that one day this could happen…would happen…and yet I filed it away in the back of my mind with all the other things I couldn’t quite bring myself to think about.  How many times had he walked out of that door, not knowing when he would return, but promising me that he would?

Has ten minutes passed, or is it an hour?  Will he come alone or will he bring the others?   It is then that the thought hits me, is my husband the only one who didn’t make it?  Was he alone, or was his partner beside him?

This doesn’t seem real.  Three days ago he was promising me he would take some vacation and that we would go to Aspen.  Three days ago seems like a lifetime now.

I should call his family, yet I can’t.  My hands won’t stop shaking long enough to dial and I know that even if they did, my voice wouldn’t let me say the words.  As long as I don’t say the words then there’s a chance.  Once I say them it becomes real.  No turning back.

A car sweeps into the driveway.  I want to hide, pretend that I’m out.  If I do then maybe he’ll walk through that door, carrying take out and a bottle of wine.  We’ll feed each other, drink, become one until dawn breaks.

This has to be a mistake.  He’s too good to let this happen, been doing this too long.  No, he is not dead.

The door swings open and I raise my head expectantly.  But it isn’t him.  I don’t want to hear this, I don’t want to hear this, I don’t want to hear this.

But I can’t hide from the truth anymore.