Have you ever had the one thing you loved most in your life wrenched away
from you without warning? Perhaps; everything dies some day. But was she
still alive when you lost her? Did you have to see her every day after you
lost her, though her presence was painful? Had she been your friend and
lover for five long years? Was she your wife in everything but name?
Were you, in fact, hiding the two rings that were made to bind you in eternal love on a chain around your neck?
Sounds pretty bad, doesn't it? Mind you, I'm not feeling sorry for myself. Those are just the facts. Here's my story.
She first came to me when she was fifteen, requesting that I teach her all I know about my career. Though I was five years her senior, I couldn't help running my eyes over her. At first, she seemed very plain. Her chestnut- brown hair was cut as short as mine, and her body was hidden by a shapeless blue dress, the only hint of her curves shown by the apron tied around her slender waist. She had big, soft brown eyes that somehow reminded me of a cow. Gentle, loving. I shook my head quickly, ridding my mind of these thoughts. I was no pedophile, and I refused to look at a minor that way. She was a sweetheart, though, and I took a liking to her.
My fondness for her increased as I taught her. She was very quick, and wasn't hesitant to ask me questions when she was unsure of something. Those big brown eyes took in everything around her, and memorized everything in the immense medical textbooks around her. Generations of skill were passed down to her, as both her mother and her grandmother had been midwives. By the time she was seventeen, I made her my assistant nurse.
I felt my affection for her swell to enormous proportions. I didn't just like this girl. She wasn't just my apprentice. She was my best friend, and I loved her.
She became the one I ran to with my problems. When I had something to say, she just sat and listened, those soft brown eyes taking in every word I said. She was the first one in the village to learn my real name. To her, I wasn't the distant Doctor that was only important when the flu came to town. She knew me as Kevin, the man, someone who she could talk to and come to with her emotional problems as well as her physical ones. I was something more to her.
The summer after she turned seventeen, she invited me to the beach to watch the fireworks with her. I accepted, and she told me to bring my swimming trunks, as we would be going for a nighttime swim after the show.
When I got to the beach, trunks and towel draped over my arm, she was waiting for me. "Sit here, Kevin," she said, patting a space next to her on the big beach towel she had spread out on the sand. I complied. As the colorful rockets went off in the sky, I felt her lean against me, her head on my shoulder.
"Have I ever told you how I felt about you, Kevin?" I looked around for nearby people. Everyone else on the beach was engaged in the fireworks. I turned my head back to my shoulder, and my eyes found hers. She smiled.
"I love you, Doctor."
How clichéd can you get? I heard those words from her for the first time as she leaned against my shoulder on a warm summer night, watching fireworks explode in the air. It just seemed so perfect. This girl that I had secretly loved for two years just admitted that the feeling was mutual. My life was perfect.
"I love you too, Elli."
When everyone left, we sat for a moment, enjoying each other's company. Then she headed off behind the beach house to change into her suit, and I changed on the beach. I walked over to the dock and sat on the edge, dangling my feet in the water.
"I'm ready."
I turned around, and there she was: my gorgeous Elli, unburdened by her frumpy dress and housewife-esque apron, standing on the beach in a string bikini. I could appreciate her curves for the first time now, and I took in her shape greedily. She walked up to me and slid her arms around my waist, hugging me. Suddenly we lost our balance, and tumbled into the water, laughing all the way down. Our lips met, and we reveled in each other's kisses. Somehow, the suits were lost in our passion, and we lost ourselves under the moonlight.
For the next two seasons, she was my lover. Of course, no one could know of it; what would the village say if they knew what exactly I was doing with that particular minor? Twenty-two year old men should be with women their own age, not with teenagers. But that didn't stop us. She would complain of an almost nightly stomachache to her grandmother, and would end up in the clinic overnight. Of course, her stomach was fine. So was every other part of her, and I knew her body so intimately that I would know if anything was wrong. I knew the shape of the birthmark on her thigh as well as the back of my hand. Life was wonderful.
One morning she came into the clinic, her face drawn with worry. I took her into my embrace and asked her what the matter was.
"I missed it," she said, wringing her apron in her hands. It was full of wrinkles, and I assumed she had been doing this for a while. "Twice."
"What did you miss?" I asked, fearing for the worst.
She looked straight into my eyes, and my worries were confirmed. She was carrying my unwanted child. "What can we do?" I inquired, holding her hands to keep her from wrinkling her apron more.
She sighed mournfully, and tears ran down her cheeks. "I don't believe in abortions, but...oh, Kevin, I can't ruin my life this way!" With that, she fell into my arms, her liquid misery seeping into my shirt.
I had no choice but to get her the antidote. It hurt so badly, and I knew what I was doing when I removed the child from her womb: I was killing my own baby. I was a murderer, and I had killed my own child. I hated myself for it, and I knew that Elli hated herself too. That winter was a cold one indeed.
Spring came, along with Elli's eighteenth birthday. It cheered us slightly that what we were doing together was now legitimate. In celebration, we walked up to the top of Mother's Hill, looking out at the fantastic view below. As we sat there, holding each other and watching the sunset, we heard footsteps behind us. We turned, and there was none other than Pastor Carter, taking a walk. We threw ourselves apart, but it was too late; Carter had spotted us.
He raised an eyebrow. "So that's why Elli's never at home at night," he said. "How long have you two been seeing each other?" My mind filled with dread. He knew, he knew! The purest man in the village knew that we had been sleeping together for the past two seasons. How could we get out of this one?
Carter sighed, shaking his head. "You do know that it's a sin to bed before you're married, right?" I looked at Elli. Her eyes were cast to the ground, ashamed.
I looked up at the Pastor, biting my lip. "Please don't tell anyone," I pleaded. "It would ruin Elli's life. She'd be called a whore when she walked through the streets, and I don't know if I could take it..."
Elli looked at me, shocked. "You wouldn't be around to be upset about it!" she cried. "You'd be in jail for sleeping with a minor!" My eyes widened. It was true: I'd go to jail for being in love with Elli.
Carter looked at us, and put his hand into a pocket in his robes, searching for something. He pulled the hand out, and in it were two gold rings and two silver chains. He looked up at us.
"Take these," he said. "You two can't get married yet; you're much too young, and it would ruin both your lives. But this way, you'll be married in spirit, and I won't have to tell the villagers that you've been doing anything illegal. Husbands and wives are supposed to make love, right?"
We took the rings, strung them on the chains, and hung them around our necks, hiding them inconspicuously under our clothing. "Thank you, Pastor!" screamed Elli, throwing her arms around his neck. I shook Carter's hand, knowing that I would be forever grateful to him. These would last us until we were ready to get married for real.
Two years passed in relative quiet. Elli still lived with her grandmother, though her nights were spent with me in the clinic. We lived in almost as much happiness as a married couple, our only problem the fear that we would be discovered. But other than that, our lives were happy.
Or so I thought.
One day, a new farmer came to the village. He inherited the farm that his grandfather had just left behind when he died. The farmer's name was Jack, and he was a really nice guy. The first time he walked into the clinic, he had scraped up his knee pretty badly, and Elli gave him a bandage. Weeks passed by, and Jack became a great friend of mine. He brought me wine occasionally, and I marveled at the kindness of this man I barely knew. He flirted with Elli a bit, but I didn't dislike him; how could he know that we were lovers?
One night, as Elli lay in my arms after a bout of lovemaking, she talked to me about Jack. "Did I tell you that he asked me to the Goddess Festival?" she asked me.
I shook my head. "What did you say?" I asked, tensing in fear.
Elli felt me tense, and she laughed. "I told him that I was going with someone else, of course." She kissed me on my nose. "Don't be jealous, Kevvy. You know I would never go with anyone but you."
I laughed as well, my nervousness abating. How could I ever doubt her? "Well, you never know," I said teasingly. "You're a gorgeous girl, and it would be easy enough for some guy to decide to steal you away."
The seasons came and went. At about midsummer, Elli informed me that her grandmother was ill, and that she would be sleeping at home to make sure she was all right. I was sad, but I kissed her goodbye and gave her a bottle of Bodigizer for her grandmother. She kissed me back, but for some reason, her kiss seemed colder than usual. Perhaps I was just overreacting from the fact that I would be sleeping alone for a while.
A week later, when the clinic was closed, I went out for a walk. Elli's grandmother sat on a rocking chair outside of her house, and I waved to her as I passed by. She didn't seem to be ill...in fact, she seemed to be the picture of perfect health. I pushed those thoughts out of my brain, reminding myself that looks could often be deceiving. "Feeling better?" I asked. She looked at me, puzzled. "I guess," she said, smiling as if to some child who had just proposed that the moon was made of cheese. I would have questioned her on this, but I was expected at someone's home, and I couldn't stop to chat.
I felt suspicion well up in me like an overflowing bathtub. What was up with Elli? Why was she acting so strange lately? It baffled me, and over the next few weeks I watched her a little closer.
One day in autumn as I sat in my office, writing up a report on the health of the villagers, I heard the door open and close. I ignored it and continued on my work. Soon, I heard giggling. I paused in my report. That wasn't the kind of laugh she had when she was giggling with her friends over the latest gossip in the village. No, that was the sound Elli made when I kissed the side of her neck when we sat alone in the back pews in church, or trailed my fingers up the inside of her thighs when we were supposed to be watching the sunrise on New Year's Eve. That was the quiet, try-to-be-inconspicuous sound Elli made when she was doing something naughty in the same room as other people.
And it wasn't with me.
I peeked out from behind the curtains that served as the walls to my office, only putting my head out far enough to see Elli's position at the reception desk. I had done this often over the years, watching as she idly filed her nails while waiting for someone to enter the clinic, or as she pointed out pretty dresses in catalogues with the occasional visiting friend. But this time what I saw wasn't happy, and I wasn't gazing dreamily at her while she played solitaire at the reception desk.
Jack was behind her chair, running his hands along her upper arms, kissing the sides of her neck as I had done so many times before over the past two years. My jaw dropped as I saw his hands wander to her breasts, fondling them as only I had before. His hands went back up to the collar of her dress, and slipped in side it, feeling down her chest. He stopped suddenly, and pulled his hand back up, holding something. It was our ring.
"What is this thing?" he asked quietly, looking at her. "I was gonna ask you why you wear it if you're just gonna take it off every night before we do it."
Elli smiled at him, and I felt my heart pang with grief. That was my smile. Mine. Tat was the smile she had given me on that summer night at the fireworks show when she told me she loved me. "It's nothing," she said. "Just some useless piece of junk." With that, she took the necklace from Jack's hands and tossed it in the trash.
I pulled my head back into my office, staring through the unfinished report in my lap. It all made sense now. My lonely nights, the cold kisses that had grown sparse, her lack of desire for the public affection that she had once loved. The healthy grandmother, sitting outside of her house, looking at me like I was a fool. And I was a fool. How right she was.
The giggling continued, and then I heard Elli speak. "You'd better go, Jack," she whispered. To me, it sounded like a booming roar. "I don't want Old Grumpy over there to hear us."
Jack laughed. "Of course not," he returned. I heard the sound of a kiss on her cheek. My cheek. "See ya tonight, babe." The door opened, then closed.
I felt my heart twist in pain, and disappear into nothingness. I continued to stare through the document on my lap until Elli popped her head into my office. "I'm going home, ok, Doctor?" She looked at me, tilting her head. "You don't look so good. Maybe you should go to bed early tonight." I nodded. She took the paper from my hands, and smiled. "I'll finish this," she said. "I'm sure Grandma won't mind if I take a break from feeding her spoonfuls of Bodigizer to do a bit of paperwork. 'Night!" The door opened and closed again, and Elli walked out of the clinic.
I turned off all the lights and locked up, doing everything mechanically. I found myself in bed, staring up at the dark ceiling. My head turned to the empty pillow to my left, and I remembered the head that used to lay there, the big brown eyes that would open in the morning, look into mine, and then work together with the mouth to make what I thought was my personal smile. I remembered waking up to see those eyes staring down at the ring that she wore around her neck, fiddling with it. I remembered so many things. Everything about her seemed to be embedded in that pillow. I looked down at my body, and saw that I had automatically curved into the position I would've taken to line up against her body, my arm draped across the empty bed. I felt the tears come freely now, spilling down onto that empty pillow, into what would have been her hair.
A week later, Elli came to me, smiling brightly. "I have great news, Doctor!" she exclaimed.
I feigned a smile. "What's up?"
"Jack asked me to marry him!"
I somehow kept the fake smile on my face, pretending to be understanding. "That's great!" I said, wondering if I would explode at that moment.
Elli leapt at me and hugged me, the first genuine hug that I'd gotten from her for three seasons. "I just knew you'd approve!" she cried, and kissed me on the cheek. I beamed at her, hoping that it looked real. She ran out of the clinic, screaming with joy, and I let my face drop. When I thought about her walking out of my life, I definitely didn't expect her to be skipping as she did so, much less screaming with happiness. I willed the tears away for now, saving them for her wedding, hoping that people would think I was just a sensitive man at a happy event, and not a blubbering love-deprived fool.
I sat alone in the back pew at the wedding. I didn't want to be near anyone else, though sitting in that pew pained me. I couldn't hold back the many memories that flooded me there, making me remember what I had done in that pew with the bride in previous years. I watched as Jack kissed Elli on the lips, in the position that I had always hoped I would end up in. But of course not. That would never happen to Old Grumpy. Old Grumpy would be a bachelor for life, watching the younger people get married and have happy lives and big families. Has anyone ever been so bitter at their best friend's wedding? Probably not. Who could be bitterer than Old Grumpy?
The tears flowed from my eyes many more times after that wedding. I was alone in the clinic all the time. Sure, the customers kept me company, but I was never as close to any of them as I was to Elli. My best friend beside her had been Jack, and he never came to the clinic at all after he married Elli. Well, except for once, when he found out that Elli was pregnant.
When he told me that she was carrying his child, I faked a smile and told him how wonderful it was, and what he had to do to take care of his pregnant wife. But inside I was seething. I wanted nothing more than to tell him that Elli had been carrying my child first, but I had cared for her reputation so much that I had killed that child with my bare hands to preserve it. I wanted to laugh in his face and tell him that it had been I that had taken her virginity, I who had to buy different methods of birth control to keep from impregnating her again and again. It took me one try to get her pregnant, and it took him three whole seasons! He was a huge loser, and my sperm were better, so there.
But of course, I couldn't say that. I let my professional voice take over and tell him what to do and what she should eat. He asked me to be present at the birth, and I 'gladly' told him that I wouldn't miss it for anything in the world, and would make sure that the baby would come out safely.
Unfortunately, I had to stay true to my word. The day came all to soon, and I helped Elli get Jack's child into the world. I was the first one to hold her baby girl in my arms, and the first to see those big, soft brown eyes looking into mine. Such betrayal by a woman I loved and a man I had liked, and yet I loved the result of it.
Fifteen years later, a teenage girl with big brown eyes and a cute, though shapeless, dress came to the doorstep of the clinic. She asked me to teach her everything I knew.
I complied.
Were you, in fact, hiding the two rings that were made to bind you in eternal love on a chain around your neck?
Sounds pretty bad, doesn't it? Mind you, I'm not feeling sorry for myself. Those are just the facts. Here's my story.
She first came to me when she was fifteen, requesting that I teach her all I know about my career. Though I was five years her senior, I couldn't help running my eyes over her. At first, she seemed very plain. Her chestnut- brown hair was cut as short as mine, and her body was hidden by a shapeless blue dress, the only hint of her curves shown by the apron tied around her slender waist. She had big, soft brown eyes that somehow reminded me of a cow. Gentle, loving. I shook my head quickly, ridding my mind of these thoughts. I was no pedophile, and I refused to look at a minor that way. She was a sweetheart, though, and I took a liking to her.
My fondness for her increased as I taught her. She was very quick, and wasn't hesitant to ask me questions when she was unsure of something. Those big brown eyes took in everything around her, and memorized everything in the immense medical textbooks around her. Generations of skill were passed down to her, as both her mother and her grandmother had been midwives. By the time she was seventeen, I made her my assistant nurse.
I felt my affection for her swell to enormous proportions. I didn't just like this girl. She wasn't just my apprentice. She was my best friend, and I loved her.
She became the one I ran to with my problems. When I had something to say, she just sat and listened, those soft brown eyes taking in every word I said. She was the first one in the village to learn my real name. To her, I wasn't the distant Doctor that was only important when the flu came to town. She knew me as Kevin, the man, someone who she could talk to and come to with her emotional problems as well as her physical ones. I was something more to her.
The summer after she turned seventeen, she invited me to the beach to watch the fireworks with her. I accepted, and she told me to bring my swimming trunks, as we would be going for a nighttime swim after the show.
When I got to the beach, trunks and towel draped over my arm, she was waiting for me. "Sit here, Kevin," she said, patting a space next to her on the big beach towel she had spread out on the sand. I complied. As the colorful rockets went off in the sky, I felt her lean against me, her head on my shoulder.
"Have I ever told you how I felt about you, Kevin?" I looked around for nearby people. Everyone else on the beach was engaged in the fireworks. I turned my head back to my shoulder, and my eyes found hers. She smiled.
"I love you, Doctor."
How clichéd can you get? I heard those words from her for the first time as she leaned against my shoulder on a warm summer night, watching fireworks explode in the air. It just seemed so perfect. This girl that I had secretly loved for two years just admitted that the feeling was mutual. My life was perfect.
"I love you too, Elli."
When everyone left, we sat for a moment, enjoying each other's company. Then she headed off behind the beach house to change into her suit, and I changed on the beach. I walked over to the dock and sat on the edge, dangling my feet in the water.
"I'm ready."
I turned around, and there she was: my gorgeous Elli, unburdened by her frumpy dress and housewife-esque apron, standing on the beach in a string bikini. I could appreciate her curves for the first time now, and I took in her shape greedily. She walked up to me and slid her arms around my waist, hugging me. Suddenly we lost our balance, and tumbled into the water, laughing all the way down. Our lips met, and we reveled in each other's kisses. Somehow, the suits were lost in our passion, and we lost ourselves under the moonlight.
For the next two seasons, she was my lover. Of course, no one could know of it; what would the village say if they knew what exactly I was doing with that particular minor? Twenty-two year old men should be with women their own age, not with teenagers. But that didn't stop us. She would complain of an almost nightly stomachache to her grandmother, and would end up in the clinic overnight. Of course, her stomach was fine. So was every other part of her, and I knew her body so intimately that I would know if anything was wrong. I knew the shape of the birthmark on her thigh as well as the back of my hand. Life was wonderful.
One morning she came into the clinic, her face drawn with worry. I took her into my embrace and asked her what the matter was.
"I missed it," she said, wringing her apron in her hands. It was full of wrinkles, and I assumed she had been doing this for a while. "Twice."
"What did you miss?" I asked, fearing for the worst.
She looked straight into my eyes, and my worries were confirmed. She was carrying my unwanted child. "What can we do?" I inquired, holding her hands to keep her from wrinkling her apron more.
She sighed mournfully, and tears ran down her cheeks. "I don't believe in abortions, but...oh, Kevin, I can't ruin my life this way!" With that, she fell into my arms, her liquid misery seeping into my shirt.
I had no choice but to get her the antidote. It hurt so badly, and I knew what I was doing when I removed the child from her womb: I was killing my own baby. I was a murderer, and I had killed my own child. I hated myself for it, and I knew that Elli hated herself too. That winter was a cold one indeed.
Spring came, along with Elli's eighteenth birthday. It cheered us slightly that what we were doing together was now legitimate. In celebration, we walked up to the top of Mother's Hill, looking out at the fantastic view below. As we sat there, holding each other and watching the sunset, we heard footsteps behind us. We turned, and there was none other than Pastor Carter, taking a walk. We threw ourselves apart, but it was too late; Carter had spotted us.
He raised an eyebrow. "So that's why Elli's never at home at night," he said. "How long have you two been seeing each other?" My mind filled with dread. He knew, he knew! The purest man in the village knew that we had been sleeping together for the past two seasons. How could we get out of this one?
Carter sighed, shaking his head. "You do know that it's a sin to bed before you're married, right?" I looked at Elli. Her eyes were cast to the ground, ashamed.
I looked up at the Pastor, biting my lip. "Please don't tell anyone," I pleaded. "It would ruin Elli's life. She'd be called a whore when she walked through the streets, and I don't know if I could take it..."
Elli looked at me, shocked. "You wouldn't be around to be upset about it!" she cried. "You'd be in jail for sleeping with a minor!" My eyes widened. It was true: I'd go to jail for being in love with Elli.
Carter looked at us, and put his hand into a pocket in his robes, searching for something. He pulled the hand out, and in it were two gold rings and two silver chains. He looked up at us.
"Take these," he said. "You two can't get married yet; you're much too young, and it would ruin both your lives. But this way, you'll be married in spirit, and I won't have to tell the villagers that you've been doing anything illegal. Husbands and wives are supposed to make love, right?"
We took the rings, strung them on the chains, and hung them around our necks, hiding them inconspicuously under our clothing. "Thank you, Pastor!" screamed Elli, throwing her arms around his neck. I shook Carter's hand, knowing that I would be forever grateful to him. These would last us until we were ready to get married for real.
Two years passed in relative quiet. Elli still lived with her grandmother, though her nights were spent with me in the clinic. We lived in almost as much happiness as a married couple, our only problem the fear that we would be discovered. But other than that, our lives were happy.
Or so I thought.
One day, a new farmer came to the village. He inherited the farm that his grandfather had just left behind when he died. The farmer's name was Jack, and he was a really nice guy. The first time he walked into the clinic, he had scraped up his knee pretty badly, and Elli gave him a bandage. Weeks passed by, and Jack became a great friend of mine. He brought me wine occasionally, and I marveled at the kindness of this man I barely knew. He flirted with Elli a bit, but I didn't dislike him; how could he know that we were lovers?
One night, as Elli lay in my arms after a bout of lovemaking, she talked to me about Jack. "Did I tell you that he asked me to the Goddess Festival?" she asked me.
I shook my head. "What did you say?" I asked, tensing in fear.
Elli felt me tense, and she laughed. "I told him that I was going with someone else, of course." She kissed me on my nose. "Don't be jealous, Kevvy. You know I would never go with anyone but you."
I laughed as well, my nervousness abating. How could I ever doubt her? "Well, you never know," I said teasingly. "You're a gorgeous girl, and it would be easy enough for some guy to decide to steal you away."
The seasons came and went. At about midsummer, Elli informed me that her grandmother was ill, and that she would be sleeping at home to make sure she was all right. I was sad, but I kissed her goodbye and gave her a bottle of Bodigizer for her grandmother. She kissed me back, but for some reason, her kiss seemed colder than usual. Perhaps I was just overreacting from the fact that I would be sleeping alone for a while.
A week later, when the clinic was closed, I went out for a walk. Elli's grandmother sat on a rocking chair outside of her house, and I waved to her as I passed by. She didn't seem to be ill...in fact, she seemed to be the picture of perfect health. I pushed those thoughts out of my brain, reminding myself that looks could often be deceiving. "Feeling better?" I asked. She looked at me, puzzled. "I guess," she said, smiling as if to some child who had just proposed that the moon was made of cheese. I would have questioned her on this, but I was expected at someone's home, and I couldn't stop to chat.
I felt suspicion well up in me like an overflowing bathtub. What was up with Elli? Why was she acting so strange lately? It baffled me, and over the next few weeks I watched her a little closer.
One day in autumn as I sat in my office, writing up a report on the health of the villagers, I heard the door open and close. I ignored it and continued on my work. Soon, I heard giggling. I paused in my report. That wasn't the kind of laugh she had when she was giggling with her friends over the latest gossip in the village. No, that was the sound Elli made when I kissed the side of her neck when we sat alone in the back pews in church, or trailed my fingers up the inside of her thighs when we were supposed to be watching the sunrise on New Year's Eve. That was the quiet, try-to-be-inconspicuous sound Elli made when she was doing something naughty in the same room as other people.
And it wasn't with me.
I peeked out from behind the curtains that served as the walls to my office, only putting my head out far enough to see Elli's position at the reception desk. I had done this often over the years, watching as she idly filed her nails while waiting for someone to enter the clinic, or as she pointed out pretty dresses in catalogues with the occasional visiting friend. But this time what I saw wasn't happy, and I wasn't gazing dreamily at her while she played solitaire at the reception desk.
Jack was behind her chair, running his hands along her upper arms, kissing the sides of her neck as I had done so many times before over the past two years. My jaw dropped as I saw his hands wander to her breasts, fondling them as only I had before. His hands went back up to the collar of her dress, and slipped in side it, feeling down her chest. He stopped suddenly, and pulled his hand back up, holding something. It was our ring.
"What is this thing?" he asked quietly, looking at her. "I was gonna ask you why you wear it if you're just gonna take it off every night before we do it."
Elli smiled at him, and I felt my heart pang with grief. That was my smile. Mine. Tat was the smile she had given me on that summer night at the fireworks show when she told me she loved me. "It's nothing," she said. "Just some useless piece of junk." With that, she took the necklace from Jack's hands and tossed it in the trash.
I pulled my head back into my office, staring through the unfinished report in my lap. It all made sense now. My lonely nights, the cold kisses that had grown sparse, her lack of desire for the public affection that she had once loved. The healthy grandmother, sitting outside of her house, looking at me like I was a fool. And I was a fool. How right she was.
The giggling continued, and then I heard Elli speak. "You'd better go, Jack," she whispered. To me, it sounded like a booming roar. "I don't want Old Grumpy over there to hear us."
Jack laughed. "Of course not," he returned. I heard the sound of a kiss on her cheek. My cheek. "See ya tonight, babe." The door opened, then closed.
I felt my heart twist in pain, and disappear into nothingness. I continued to stare through the document on my lap until Elli popped her head into my office. "I'm going home, ok, Doctor?" She looked at me, tilting her head. "You don't look so good. Maybe you should go to bed early tonight." I nodded. She took the paper from my hands, and smiled. "I'll finish this," she said. "I'm sure Grandma won't mind if I take a break from feeding her spoonfuls of Bodigizer to do a bit of paperwork. 'Night!" The door opened and closed again, and Elli walked out of the clinic.
I turned off all the lights and locked up, doing everything mechanically. I found myself in bed, staring up at the dark ceiling. My head turned to the empty pillow to my left, and I remembered the head that used to lay there, the big brown eyes that would open in the morning, look into mine, and then work together with the mouth to make what I thought was my personal smile. I remembered waking up to see those eyes staring down at the ring that she wore around her neck, fiddling with it. I remembered so many things. Everything about her seemed to be embedded in that pillow. I looked down at my body, and saw that I had automatically curved into the position I would've taken to line up against her body, my arm draped across the empty bed. I felt the tears come freely now, spilling down onto that empty pillow, into what would have been her hair.
A week later, Elli came to me, smiling brightly. "I have great news, Doctor!" she exclaimed.
I feigned a smile. "What's up?"
"Jack asked me to marry him!"
I somehow kept the fake smile on my face, pretending to be understanding. "That's great!" I said, wondering if I would explode at that moment.
Elli leapt at me and hugged me, the first genuine hug that I'd gotten from her for three seasons. "I just knew you'd approve!" she cried, and kissed me on the cheek. I beamed at her, hoping that it looked real. She ran out of the clinic, screaming with joy, and I let my face drop. When I thought about her walking out of my life, I definitely didn't expect her to be skipping as she did so, much less screaming with happiness. I willed the tears away for now, saving them for her wedding, hoping that people would think I was just a sensitive man at a happy event, and not a blubbering love-deprived fool.
I sat alone in the back pew at the wedding. I didn't want to be near anyone else, though sitting in that pew pained me. I couldn't hold back the many memories that flooded me there, making me remember what I had done in that pew with the bride in previous years. I watched as Jack kissed Elli on the lips, in the position that I had always hoped I would end up in. But of course not. That would never happen to Old Grumpy. Old Grumpy would be a bachelor for life, watching the younger people get married and have happy lives and big families. Has anyone ever been so bitter at their best friend's wedding? Probably not. Who could be bitterer than Old Grumpy?
The tears flowed from my eyes many more times after that wedding. I was alone in the clinic all the time. Sure, the customers kept me company, but I was never as close to any of them as I was to Elli. My best friend beside her had been Jack, and he never came to the clinic at all after he married Elli. Well, except for once, when he found out that Elli was pregnant.
When he told me that she was carrying his child, I faked a smile and told him how wonderful it was, and what he had to do to take care of his pregnant wife. But inside I was seething. I wanted nothing more than to tell him that Elli had been carrying my child first, but I had cared for her reputation so much that I had killed that child with my bare hands to preserve it. I wanted to laugh in his face and tell him that it had been I that had taken her virginity, I who had to buy different methods of birth control to keep from impregnating her again and again. It took me one try to get her pregnant, and it took him three whole seasons! He was a huge loser, and my sperm were better, so there.
But of course, I couldn't say that. I let my professional voice take over and tell him what to do and what she should eat. He asked me to be present at the birth, and I 'gladly' told him that I wouldn't miss it for anything in the world, and would make sure that the baby would come out safely.
Unfortunately, I had to stay true to my word. The day came all to soon, and I helped Elli get Jack's child into the world. I was the first one to hold her baby girl in my arms, and the first to see those big, soft brown eyes looking into mine. Such betrayal by a woman I loved and a man I had liked, and yet I loved the result of it.
Fifteen years later, a teenage girl with big brown eyes and a cute, though shapeless, dress came to the doorstep of the clinic. She asked me to teach her everything I knew.
I complied.