Dear Hearts

Ask me in December when the frost sparkles in the branches and the sidewalks are treacherous with blackened ice. Ask me at the end and not in the beginning or the middle this tale. Have patience, dear hearts, give young Janie and Rich a fair chance together before asking will they, or won't they?

Do you remember how it felt when you trembled with pleasure in one another's arms? We know how their story might end because we have all experienced love's highs and the lows, the angry silences and the tearful make ups. We faked it when we had to as well. We negotiated its arduous pathways knowing that all cannot follow it to its end.

Ask me in December when their hair is white, and their children and grandchildren gather to hear both the funny and the sad stories of their long life together.

Ask me when their wrinkles are deep folds in their faces or when tears glisten in their eyes as they recall their wedding day or the births of each of their precious children.

Then I might weave a tale about how their lives began to fall apart when the last of their children left home and decades of suppressed hurt and ill will floated like poisonous mists in the stillness of their home.

Ask me in December about that defining moment when Janie screwed up her courage to tell Rich she was leaving him and might have if he had not returned from work as she packed her suitcase, his face grey and careworn. What's wrong, she asked stiffly, her jaw dropping as he told her in a whispered voice he had stage three pancreatic cancer.

Silent at first, she knew what a terrible sacrifice that caregiving entailed. But they had started a successful law practice and raised three children together. Even once the chemistry that had originally attracted them at Shakespeare in the park thirty-five years before had ended, they still managed to build a life together, however flawed, rocky and faked.

Is love untested truly love? Facing death tore down emotional walls in each of them. Their long-fought victory over cancer accomplished what chemistry never could.

Ask me in December, dear hearts, after Janie and Rich stopped faking it forever more.

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This story was written for Shirley Belk's unofficial challenge Endings as a follow up to her Fake it till you Make it story. When I started this, I intended something quite different. But this is what came out. Go figure. At this point of the blurb I believe the usual practice is a little shameless promoting of other stories. But if you want to read more you just have to jolly well look for them yourselves. Its late, I'm tired and I still haven't written 600 words because this is a micro-fiction after all. Have you all stopped reading yet? Well, why the hell not? I haven't got anything else to say in case you haven't noticed. I'm just yammering on and on while I watch the word count tick up. Damn, this is taking forever. Insert warning here. The thoughts expressed here do not necessarily reflect the views of Vocal. Bla, bla, bla, bla, bla this story's never going to end. Not if that ground hog keeps seeing his shadow. He has to be stopped. 600!