They sat together on the couch, the new striped couch that she bought during the remodel, the couch that was so comfortable and so welcoming. Except for now. Now, it held failure and disappointment and sadness and resolution, and so they sat perched on the edge. She wondered, briefly, if she'd have to get a new couch again. Her life, it seemed, was constantly about remodeling, both the external fixtures that made her life easier and prettier and the internal emotions that continuously threatened to spin out of control, a top with no stop button on a journey round in circles.
They held hands and as she looked down at their fingers, loosely entwined, she noticed their rings. Solid gold bands of promise still encircled the ring fingers of their left hands, hands that still touched, still felt, still wanted... something. She didn't know what.
Somewhere in the neighborhood, a car alarm sounded and a door slammed. Somewhere clocks were ticking slowly, so slowly that time was stilled, even if just briefly, just while they sat, holding hands, and wishing that this moment hadn't come but both knowing it had been predestined. It was their fate. Tears, salty and strong rolled down her cheeks and dropped onto their hands. He absently thumbed them away, one, two, three. She knew he was fighting his own emotions and part of her, the part that had always loved him and always would, wanted to touch his face, to pull him to her, to hold him and comfort him and whisper soothing words that would ultimately have no meaning. But there was no comfort, not on this night.
After another timeless moment, he started to extract his hand. He cleared his throat and moved to stand. But she wasn't ready to let go just yet, not in this moment, not when the snow hadn't started to fall, not when the lights in the house were soft and warm. Not yet. Not now. Because once she let go, it would be done. She had made the decision, she knew it was right and true and would eventually lead her back to where she should be, back to being the woman she had always been, the strong force of nature who blew in like a lilac breeze and salted the air with quick jibes and flashing eyes. She would be that woman again, she had made the first move.
But she couldn't let go of his hand and so she stood with him. She could feel his eyes on her, could feel the tension in his body as he fought to maintain control.
"I should... I have to..." he started, his voice quiet and breaking in the night.
She nodded.
"I can't..." he said and she understood the meaning of his words, of his posture, of his reluctance to go into the cold night and she understood his determination to do just that, to salvage whatever dignity there might be left, hiding under the striped couch, lurking in the corners, tucked behind her ear along with her long waves. She squeezed his hand. She couldn't let go either.
He was staring at her now and she raised her eyes to look back at him. She loved him, just not enough. He loved her, perhaps too much. And their world was spinning in different directions, clockwise and counterclockwise, upside down and backwards. It was as it had always been.
She didn't know who moved first and in the end it didn't matter. Their lips collided together in love and passion and disintegration as their hands finally released and they began to claw at one another. As he assaulted her mouth, his hands pushed her coat from her shoulders, the coat she had yet to remove, and tore at the front of her dress, opening her to him for perhaps the last time. Just as quickly she unbuttoned his shirt and pushed it from his shoulders. His mouth traveled to her neck, her collarbone, her chest. Nibbling, biting, rough. Her head snapped back in pain and desire as his lips traveled back to hers, forcing her back against him, lips against lips. Their kiss was strangled and raw and full of need, of understanding that their passion for each other had never known boundaries. For twenty-three years, they had danced this dance and they both knew it so well. Tonight, their music would end, finally. But not yet.
Holding her tightly, roughly, he pulled her down as she undid his belt, unzipped his pants. Her back on the floor, he again kissed her, strangling her with the force of his tongue before again biting his way down her body. He grabbed her stockings and panties, pushing them down her long legs, pulling them off while she blindly pulled at him, tore at his hair, dragged him back up to her where her fingernails dug into his chest, dragged down his side, scarred his back. He pushed her bra aside and bit her nipple. She gasped. He stopped just briefly, breathing heavily, mimicking the rise and fall of her chest; his eyes black. She looked back at him.
"Please, " she whispered, commanded, compelled as his lips crashed to hers again, and he rammed his way inside her. She bit his lip then, drawing blood and they both tasted the copper darkness of their union, but neither cared, neither needed anything more than to feel. Something.
Her knees quickly rose to lock around his hips, raising her body to meet each of his thrusts, angry and sad and empty, so empty, and outside the car alarm screamed and another door slammed and inside the light glowed ghostly and glanced off of her gold wedding ring and suddenly she was splintering around him, her breath in her throat, her body wracked with guilt and pleasure and as she shattered, he pushed deep into her one last time, finding his own release, and their end.
And they were done, finally.
When their breathing returned to normal, he pulled out of her, and brushed his left hand across her check. It was a gentle touch now, full of love, and he kissed her softly as he rose, leaving her still on the floor with her eyes closed, and her body exposed.
She could hear him zip his pants, could hear him refasten his belt and then she heard footsteps move toward the door where he stopped.
"Goodbye, Lorelai," he said and then he walked into the dark coldness of the night.
As she pulled her dress closed around her, she remained on the floor, feeling the hard wood against her body, through the black fabric. She shivered slightly. Wet and sore between her legs, her soul bruised, she still felt an odd peace. And so she opened her eyes, surprised but not to find them dry and clear. Her heart would follow soon enough. She slipped her ring from her finger and held it tightly in her hand, a sad smile playing on her lips. They had ended much the same way they had started, a mad tangle of limbs on an uncomfortable surface, and somehow that seemed appropriate.
"Goodbye, Chris," she whispered, rising from the floor before starting the climb up the stairs at last, at last.