A New Day

Written July, 1999

I threw open the curtains this morning hoping to see the sun shining and the day new. Although the sun shone down on me, the day was anything but new. The same yellow sun looked down on me through the same white puff of clouds. It had been two hours since you left me, and I had looked out the window over twenty times. I believed time was standing still.
As I stood with my hands holding our faded yellow curtains, I thought back to how your face looked last night. Before my world ended.
I opened the door in my pajamas expecting to find one of my girlfriends - you were at a business meeting. Instead of a smiling friendly face, I stared into your dusky blue eyes, your dark brown eyebrows brooding over them like storm clouds. The scowl on your lips almost made me snap the door closed.
When I asked what happened, I expected to hear that you had been fired. But you didn't answer. You just stared forward and wouldn't even enter for a full five minutes.
But I didn't get my answers even when you came in. You set down your briefcase and headed back to our room, where you got out your suitcase. Your business trips only required a few garment bags and your carry on, yet you kept throwing in socks and underwear. After you emptied your top drawer, you went to the next one. You packed many more shirts and pants than your luggage could carry, but you just closed the suitcase anyway, shirt sleeves and pant legs hanging out.
You dumped your toiletries into a plastic freezer bag. I noted that you took our toothpaste and dental floss. You packed your life into two suitcases, a few duffel bags, and four freezer bags. And what you didn't want, you left behind. But why was I one of them?
When you finished your hasty packing, you laid down on the couch and slept. I approached you many times to talk and wake you from your sleep. But you would have nothing to do with me.
You awoke from your slumber to make yourself breakfast. Through all of your motions, you appeared as you would on any normal day, as if last night never happened.
When you finished your eggs and toast at the early hour of six, you handed me a few papers you had tucked in your coat pocket.
I couldn't unfold the papers while you were still here. If you had something to say to me, I wanted to hear it straight from your mouth.
But through the whole bizarre experience, you didn't speak one word. You didn't even give a second glance as you walked off the porch loaded down like a mule with your luggage. You drove away in our old Chevy leaving me with the new Ford and those monthly payments. I stood in the doorway too long waiting for your return. But of course you never came.
When I finally accepted that you weren't returning anytime soon, I sat on our couch and unfolded those damn papers. It didn't take me long to figure out that the top few were divorce papers. But the bottom letter was what really broke my heart.
Paperclipped to your letter was a Polaroid of your new love. A blonde. Looking no older than a teenager. Wearing nothing but the shirt you wore last night.
Before I read the letter, I cried. I sobbed my heart out until I felt that I could continue.
That's when I held the curtains the first time and looked out at the world, hoping to find one more day put between this tragedy and the rest of my life.