Confetti hearts

The fork clattered to the floor, the sound reverberating through Jessica’s ears as she leant to pick it up. She placed it back on the table, alongside the colourful confetti hearts she had picked up on her way over to Sam’s house. The sky was getting darker as the sun began to set, leaving a burnt orange glow to filter through the windows. Closing her eyes she let the fading light wash over her as she took a deep breath. He was going to be here soon; he would ring the doorbell soon; she would open the door soon. Soon they would be together – really together. 

Not like this- all the whispering, hiding away and pretending. No, that would be over soon.

Glancing at the hearts on the table she sighed wishing it was different; that it didn’t have to be this way. But she didn’t want to think about that. It was Valentine’s day and she was looking forward to having a good day with someone she loved. She wished she could say there had been more of them.

The doorbell rang, the sound cutting through her thoughts. Her heart raced as she ran to the door to open it, and she flung her arms around Sam. He was holding a bouquet of roses for her. It crossed her mind that nobody had bought her flowers before. “Thank you Sam” she said with a smile, and she meant it. In this moment she felt truly loved, loved as people were in movies, in fairy tale romances. This was her fairy tale romance, and one she deserved after so many not-so-fairy tale romances. 

Gratitude washed over her; she felt so lucky that she had finally found someone perfect for her. She gazed at the petals, brushing her fingers over them. “I love them… I love you” she said after a moment- and she meant it. He returned the smile and the words, and everything felt perfect. It could be perfect. A worried expression passed over her face for a fleeting moment and their eyes met in time for him to catch it.

“Don’t worry, really. She won’t find out – she’s out of town until next week”. 

“But what if she does? What if she comes home early for a surprise and finds us here? I wouldn’t be able to live with myself”.

He cupped her head in his hand, “everything will be fine. This is a good thing we have. I love you. And it will be over soon anyway, I’m ending things when she gets back.”

She hoped he didn’t notice that she wasn’t convinced. She wanted to believe him, she really did, but she had heard too many empty promises and suffered too many heartbreaks to take his word for it. 

“It’s you and me against the world” he pressed further, bringing her back to the earth before she had time to convince herself that he had to be lying. ‘you and me against the world’ she thought. ‘I don’t know if that’s true. It feels like the world against us, against me.’

He turned to glance into the dining room “Wow! Look at this spread. That’s a first” he gestured to the table, “confetti hearts and everything.” She smiled, but it didn’t reach her eyes. He didn’t notice. “For both of us” she replied. As he sat down she went to find a vase for the flowers, settling for a glass after some fruitless searching. For the next hour they sat and ate, and drank and laughed, and wished and dreamed. They made plans about the future; where they would go; what they would do; looking forward to a life together.

She remembered why she had committed to this, to him, in the first place. And still the doubt creeped in, the doubt that kept clipping her wings, that wouldn’t leave her alone. ‘He is all the things I ever wanted in someone, so why do I feel like this? Why am I still only half here?’. She clutched the glass a little tighter and found no reflection in the wine; no reflection to ground her or remind her who she was. She felt she was becoming someone she couldn’t recognise. But she was happy.

“Do I deserve to be happy Sam?” she asked him suddenly. 

His glassy eyes softened and he pulled her closer, “of course you deserve to be happy” he replied, “why wouldn’t you?”.

“Because of what I’m doing to get it.” 

“Me and her - our relationship was broken long before I met you. You can’t blame yourself for that”.

“But I do, I can’t help it. What if it is me? What if I’m the reason you end up unhappy?”

“Don’t worry about that, let’s just enjoy the rest of the night.”

His charming smile convinced her to agree. She nodded “OK”.

He left for the bathroom and she started clearing up the table, packing the plates away, wiping the confetti hearts into the bin. She reached to get a stray heart left behind, knocking the glass of wine over. As it cracked, the wine spread over the tablecloth and began dripping onto the floor.

She cursed under her breath and started hastily wiping it up with a cloth. As it soaked through with red she noticed some wine had run into a cabinet drawer at the end of the table, which had been slightly ajar. She cursed again ‘I really hope there’s nothing valuable in there’ she thought as she dried out the cloth, ‘but I didn’t leave the draw open’. She slowly opened the lower cabinet drawer wincing, hoping she hadn’t ruined anything. She gave a sigh of relief. ‘It’s just some sewing equipment –needles and threads. That’s okay, I can replace them easily before Sam even has time to notice.’ She looked down the corridor quickly to check that he wasn’t coming, and when she looked back down at the drawer she noticed something else lying at the bottom. 

Her searching hands closed around something flat that felt like wood or glass. Picking it up to look at it in the light she froze. It was a framed picture of Sam and his wife on their wedding day. Her heart was rapidly sinking. They looked so happy, so in love, so perfect. As happy as she was. 

She thrust the thoughts aside as Sam called out “Is everything alright? I thought I heard something break?”

“Everything’s fine. Just a wine glass”, she responded.

“Ok, I’ll just be a minute”.

She looked at the picture again instead of putting it back - she couldn’t help it. She’d never seen his wife before, only heard about her. It was mostly bad. And she had believed it, believed that this woman was bad, that she didn’t deserve Sam. But here in this photo she didn’t look like someone who was bad, she didn’t look like someone who’s heart deserved to be broken. Could so much have changed since then? Would their love sour too? Her thoughts spiralled, ‘What if he was wrong about her, or what if he was lying? Maybe she was still madly in love with him, and not the loveless woman she had been made out to be. No I can’t think like this! I knew what I was getting into, I knew what was going to happen.’ She cut herself off. ‘I should’ve known it wouldn’t be different this time’. Her eyes fixed on the photo again and she caught her reflection. She looked so warped and her eyes looked so sad, and Sam made her so happy.

His footsteps came down the corridor carrying a gift and a box of chocolates with a card. He saw the wine still dripping onto the floor. He saw the bottom draw open. He saw a note lying on top of the framed wedding photo on the table. He looked up just in time to hear the door swinging shut.