She is folding up her blue shirt and putting it away on top of her favourite pile. The pile that has all of what she likes to wear best, for special occasions. They are not fancy items, only pieces of clothing given to her by friends, or her mom. Also, that slick black lacy thing… how he used to like it on her until his consciousness lasted. She never wore it again.
She will probably not wear the blue thing again.
Lampshade the shape of a star shedding soft terracotta splendour to the otherwise blank walls, and comfortable settee make her living-room welcoming at all times. She needs the homey comfort of familiar objects to warm her after each day spent at the hospital. She likes her work. She does. She is also good at it. But there is just too much pain and the constant presence of death. Despite what she shows, it sometimes throws her into the deepest pit of desperation she has ever known, including the time she had to bury a husband.
The book is so uninteresting. Night crawlers and spectres gather up outside the building for their nightly assault on the unsuspecting realm of the living. She does not have to look, she knows they are there. She doesn't fear them, not since they took him away from her. She knows there is a passing for everyone, and whoever is left to live is left for a purpose. She does her best to look for her own private purpose, but in the ruckus of events happening to her, and her thoughts that she can't control any longer, she is unable to perceive the reason. Used to think it was him. Maybe it was him. After all, she made his last days tolerable. She almost died in the process herself, but that was probably the price she had to pay for it. Almost inaudible whisper outside makes her turn her head and stare blankly at the glass: threshold to the other world, she used to think way, way back, when only a fledgling of a woman, Allie.
She puts the book aside, realizing she will not read tonight. Her lips recall his taste, slightly acrid, with a wisp of not yet admitted longing. His arms, eventually around her, had almost made her faint with desire. She had sucked as much as she could out of him, trying to keep him within herself. Weeks separate her from that precious moment, but she senses everything as clearly as if she had frozen time. He had been hers then, and she will cherish his memory, facing him day by day at work, trying to regain composure each time after turning back on him. He had called her back to the hospital, yes. But he is as distant as ever. Impenetrable, sarcastic, typically himself. She acts normal, even happy at times; she had learnt the trade when her husband was dying. How ironic: she never thought she would use those skills again.
Book in her lap, soft music playing, she dozes off. She is almost there. Her limbs are numb, tingling with the long-awaited numbness of sleep. Thoughts chase each other inside her head, real memories, craved memories never come true, fears, bizarre conversations. She directs her half-dream toward peaceful, serene happiness with him; after that, wild fight leading to animal carnality; his smile, his frown, his hand, his scar, his sneakers, his cane twirling in his deft hand, his eyes, his eyes, his eyes the look on his face seeing her with a cup of tea when she gave him the present he says yes do you like me house I need to know yes yes yes
Moth flies into the illusory light and falls dead, scorched by bliss, unaware of the tiny female body, which reposes unconscious in illusory oblivion. The night drapes everything, endless life stirring everywhere, minute corpse under the lamp, small human entity and all, with resolute obscurity.