Wistful Thinking

Taking care not to crease her dress, she sat down delicately on the sofa and forced her feet into heels, much higher than any she would normally wear.  They must be new, he thought. He had always preferred her in flat shoes, but in the last few weeks, he’d noticed that she’d taken to occasionally wearing stilettos and he didn’t like it.

It pleased him to see that she was wearing the blue dress though. He knew that she’d thrown out a lot of her old clothes and belongings recently and he was glad, almost relieved, that the dress hadn’t been amongst them.  He thought that she looked even better in the dress tonight than she had done at his mother’s 70th birthday party last March.  She was slimmer now, he noticed.

He smiled as he remembered the heated discussion they’d had when he gave her the dress as an early Christmas present last year.  She’d lifted it out of the bag and had barely looked at it before demanding that he take it back because it was too expensive.  She said he should have put the money towards their savings, rather than squandering it on a dress she would barely ever wear.  He was hurt, but hadn’t been surprised by her reaction. In fact, he’d anticipated it. Since the last miscarriage, the bickering had become an almost daily occurrence.

He watched as she lifted the small compact mirror slightly above her head and ran a finger under each of her eyes to remove any rogue traces of mascara, just as she had always done before a night out.  She put down the mirror on the coffee table and stared straight ahead, anxiously playing with the gold bracelet on her left wrist. She’s waiting for someone, he thought.

She made a quick glance in the direction of the front door and stood up abruptly. The doorbell.  She picked up the compact mirror, checking her make-up one final time before dropping it into her grey clutch bag.  She shouldn’t have worn those shoes, he thought again, as he watched her shuffle uncomfortably towards the living room door. She reached across to turn off the light.

He flinched in the sudden darkness as he recognized the reflection of his prematurely lined face in the oily black of what had once been his living room window.