I opened the door quickly, casually, as I always did. My feet finding their way over the threshold without me giving the order. I stumble absentmindedly, my mind once again caught up in all the things I have to do, places I said I’d go today and never got around to. My composure regained I scan the dimly lit living room searching for what fouled me up. The room faintly illuminated by the city light flooding through the closed drapes does little to help me find my way. As my eyes adjust they find nothing which would have caused the trip. Off handedly I toss my briefcase and coat to the floor, making sure to place my keys in the the leaf shaped porcelain dish Marissa bought on our honeymoon. I remember the minute she spied it through the shop window, the way her eyes lit up. Suddenly the thought of her has me headed quickly towards the bedroom where she lay, surely fast asleep. I grasp the door handle like the edges of a dream disappearing, and pull it towards me, savoring the moment my eyes take her in. My gaze filtered through the luxury the long hours that I work provide, I see her, breathe her in, and her beauty does not disappoint. Curls as black as pitch spread out on the pillow surrounding her head, a crown of ringlets denoting the princess she is. She lies so still, so majestic, it’s all I can do to quickly remove my clothes and slide in next to her. The roughness of the satin sheets tag brushes my skin and I recoil in disgust at the stark contrast of heavenly sensations meeting paper. I kick at it, simultaneously moving myself closer to her, to my Marissa. Our skin meets, and the subtle warmth of her feels like home, and like a womb it envelopes me. Now right beside her, I lay my head on her bare breast and fall quickly to sleep.

I dream of us. I dream of her smile and her eyes which say everything in an instant in lieu of lips that seldom speak. As morning dawns I wake with icy finality. I am clutching to Marissa for warmth and find only the oddity and strangeness of cold hard limbs. Pressing my head to her chest once again, it was what I didn’t hear that sent me reeling from the bed. It was then I saw it, the note I had mistaken for the satin sheets tag: