This is How it Happened

She stood in her flowing gown, staring at the body she once called husband. She liked to call him body, had stopped seeing him as a man a long time ago. She felt something for him once. She was young and in love, and when he walked into his father parlour to seek her hand, she wanted nothing more.

She continued to stare without blinking. The days of glory were over. The time she worshiped his feet was long gone. The light had started to die from her eyes on the night of their weeding when he couldn’t do anything because of how drunk he was. She has waited the following night, and the one after. He preferred his whores – the young ones. He looked at the bottle more than he looked at her.

She had wondered at first if it was her, if all the tales and songs about her beauty were a lie. She had believed she needed to do more, to understand more. She loved him fiercely. But all that crashed when she learned he married her for her name and wealth. The love died slowly when she realised he only needed her pretty face for his endless parties.

The body was still as she watched. She has no tear in her eyes. There were no lines on her face for she had worked hard to banish them. She knew the people thought her cold. How else would he take to the bottles if she wasn’t. She believed it too, for sometime. Until that night at the garden. Lucio was visiting again. He always did whenever he had breaks from his studies. She never paid attention to him. He bore a striking resemblance to her husband – the same golden hair and light blue eyes. But you could tell instantly that he was younger, for he still had some boyish looks.

The night was moonless when it happened. She had waited on him as expected of her, and when he stumbled in before midnight with barely an open eye, she returned to the garden to watch the gentle sway of the flowers and let the breeze sooth her raw nerves. Lucio had come looking for her. He always had this painful, almost pitiful look in his eyes which she always ignored. He never talked to her directly, not until that night. She was touching a single dahlia when she heard footsteps behind her. She turned and they both stood there looking at each other. She didn’t know how long. She also didn’t know she had tears on her cheeks until he raised a finger to her face. Everything happened so fast then. She was weeping on his shoulder this minute and he was kissing her the next. She kissed him back. He had broken it and almost ran from the garden. That night, as she lay in her bed alone, she knew something had been awakened in her, a fire that would slowly spread.

The months moved by slowly. She tended the fields and saw to the upkeep of the household. She carried out her duties as the mistress and ignored the body he no longer saw as her husband. Her free time, she spent writhing and moaning under Lucio. And that time was often. It didn’t matter which hour of the day it was.

She watched as the body was finally laid into the coffin. Two nights ago when he staggered into her room to collect like he always did, she knew it was time. She stayed still and let him abuse her body. She stopped fighting a long time ago. It only left her with with dark bruises and kept her inside. Poisoning his drink was easy. She was tired of counting the days. She couldn’t live like that anymore.

As they lower him into the ground, she hugged her son tight, kissed his golden hair and let him weep for the man he called father.

I'm slowly learning to write without dialogue or tags. Seems to be working. Telling a story without those little pieces is a skill.

Tell me your thoughts.

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