A SAD ENDING

The following story was published in 2014 by Polar Expressions in the anthology “That Golden Summer”.

The Memory Of White Wine

            I haven’t had white wine since that night.  The sight of it, the scent of it, the taste of it are unbearable.  It’s the memory of that night, you see.

            It was 1984 and I was thirty-three years old.  That night ended my naiveté and my belief in impossible miracles.

            Dennis handed me a glass of white wine.  “What happened?” he asked, as he sat on a stool in front of me in our living room.

            So I told him.  “I’ve been unfaithful to you.  I want a divorce,” I said, and then gulped the wine.

            As he sat in silence, I poured myself more wine.

            “You were supposed to be working with David, not sleeping with him,” he said, looking at me with tragic eyes.

            I drank more wine.

            “But you gave me to him, Den.  You told me to go away with him to work, that you’d be home with our children.”

            “You’re right.  I did,” he said, with sagging shoulders.  “I never thought we would end this way, though.”

            “What do you mean?  That you had the right to cheat whenever you wanted but I couldn’t?” I asked softly, guzzling my wine and pouring more.

            “But that’s different,” he said.  “You’re not another man.  You can’t give me what I want, you don’t have the right body.  But you’re not gay, so I can satisfy you.  You don’t need another man.”

            The tears were streaming down his face.  If I left, both of us would have to accept the truth of our own desires.  I drank more wine.

            “But, Den, you know you don’t want to make love to me.  It’s not what you want for you.  I’m your cover in a homophobic world.  I want more than that for myself.  And you want more, too,” I said, as my own tears dripped into my wine.

            Our pain was naked.  There would be no understanding from others for either one of us.  The world still judged too harshly those not yet explained by science.  He would be shunned for being homosexual.  And I would be ostracized for having been married to him.  I swigged more wine.

            We understood each other’s pain.  After eleven years of marriage, we finally knew that our love and compassion for each other weren’t enough to keep us together, even for our children.  We’d both be forced out of the closet.

            I finished the bottle of wine.  For the first time I was the one who was drunk.  He picked me up and carried me to our bed for the last time.

            I haven’t had white wine since.

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By Lisa A. Hatton