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I Still Have Your Favorite Sweater
There’s no going back.
In the bottom drawer of the chest, tucked neatly as if to be forgotten, is the red sweater you wore that last night. It’s been unfolded and refolded so many times that the creases are pressed into the fabric. Sometimes I’ll take it out and just caress the soft memory of something you once owned. It’s all I have left after all this time.
There were winter nights you had shrugged out of the sweater and thrown it to the floor before you kissed me hungrily and pinned me to the bed. By morning, sometimes I’d wear the discarded sweater just to keep the scent of you close as if I were afraid I’d lose you in the spare moments between us.
If I close my eyes, I can still recall you standing there at the bottom of the staircase, a smile on your face as you held out a glass of champagne. And there, amid the bubbles, was a gold ring with an oval-shaped diamond. I should have taken the flute and marveled at how poignant it all was as happy tears collected in my eyes.
Instead, all I could think of was you with her, tangled together in the backseat of her car, the windows fogged from the deceit you had sought to hide.
I can’t remember everything that happened that night, but the champagne glass shattered. I know that because the sharp fragments were just one of…
