Old Couple
by Tara Mandarano
Even now there are eighty-year-old versions of us hovering above a hospice room, afraid to fall all the way in. To know what that ultimately means. Death, and whichever one of us was right about heaven. ÃÛÌÒÓ°Ïñ coming back as an owl.
We are not sitting awkwardly together in some sanitized waiting room in 2024, divorced, forced to fake-check our phones, dying to get out, desperate to get away from each other.
No, those old versions of us are actually dying. And every day without forgiveness gets us there quicker.
We are not that old couple I always thought we'd become. The ones I spotted and pointed out to you in the street in our thirties, back when life was unfathomable without you and me as the centerpiece.
Now it's been four decades, and there is nothing waiting for us. All those paper flowers have long curled up. Our vows forgotten words you can't reach and pull down into your mouth or mind. Your memory sealed up tight.
You with no hair, looking like your dad, me with my freckles faded, the image of my mother, when you knew her. Our young bodies long gone with our love.
I am wearing a headscarf to stay warm, and your hands are hesitant because we are not married anymore.
You are not my emergency contact, the person to pull the plug if there was one. You are no longer my favourite, at least out loud. In my heart, the news tells another story. Even when the man that mattered most hurts you the worst, you never forget the way he lights up a room, the way he left your life in darkness. When he re-enters it to say goodbye, you know it really is the end.