White Picket Fence

Charles woke to the sun pouring through the slats of the Shaker shuttered windows of the bedroom where he and his wife had shared a bed for seventeen years.

He quietly slipped from beneath the duvet and padded across the hardwoods and braided throws to the bathroom. Standing beneath the steaming water that ran from the shower head, he pondered his day.

He retrieved his razor from the cabinet and smoothly, without haste nor jerky motions, shaved the face he had seen staring back at him for forty-seven years. Smooth, without scratch or nick. He replaced his razor.

Charles was slim, not carrying around the beer-bellied appearance that most of his neighbors and colleagues carried around. He wore a pair of blue jeans well and wasn't oblivious to the general fashion trend.

Today he donnned a pair of blue jeans and pulled a hunter green sweater over his head, tousling his hair a bit. He slipped from the bedroom and made his way to the kitchen to pour a cup of coffee. He ventured through the front door and into the crisp morning.

Charles walked each morning, but this particular morning he noticed the frost covered pumpkins and realized that children dressed as fairies and ghouls would soon be ringing the door bells throughout the neighborhood. Charles continued to walk, listening to barked greetings, watching leaves dance gently through the air and land gently on the ground before him. How fast the year had gone.

Charles neared the end of his walk and as he came upon the white picket fence encircling the yard where his children had once played, he noticed a picket that he had missed when he recently repainted it white.

Charles coffee cup was empty. He slipped inside to pour another. His wife sat quietly in their breakfast nook, coffee in hand and paper laid neatly before her. She commented on yesterday's closing bell, the rumblings of a volcano far off in Alaska and the upcoming elections.

They discussed their plans for their day. Charles would split and stack fire wood, as the evenings required a fire in the fire place. He would mow the yard once the temperatures broke fifty and wash the truck if they broke sixty.

Gwen would visit the market and pharmacy in town. She didn't expect to be gone long. Yes, they agreed, they'd chat over sandwiches and potato salad at lunchtime.

Charles had always enjoyed splitting fire wood.
It was physically demanding, reminding him often of a variety of little used muscles. It was a task that required no company and no conversation, solitude.

As the sun rose, the temperature followed steadily in it's path. Charles edged their driveway, following it alongside the house and continuing on to the guesthouse that stood behind their house, amidst Gwen's flower beds. The melting frost twinkled over each living thing and dripped from those leaves that had turned brown beneath the frost.

He then swung his leg swiftly over the cold leather seat of his Craftsman and cut clean, crisp parallel rows across his yard. This would be the last mow of the season, the dipping temperatures would thwart any further growth this year. It wouldn't be long and snow would blanket the yard and banks would line the street in front of the house.

Gwen pulled her all practical station wagon down the drive, past Charles - who was just drying his pickup, between the rose gardens and pulled to a stop just outside of the kitchen door.

Standing side by side in the kitchen, Gwen and Charles removed French Baguettes and fresh herbs, a variety of fresh vegetables and a box of high fiber cereal, five pounds of sugar, oranges, and a half gallon of milk from the brown paper bags that Gwen insisted on at the market.

She then retrieved the bag from the pharmacy and set several medications on a tray in the breakfast nook. She's prided herself on patronizing the home town pharmacist, rather than the pharmaceutical chains that had sprung up on the outskirts of town.

Charles stacked the fire place as the afternoon went on, while Gwen prepared fresh linguini, her very own pasta sauce and prepared garlic butter for the French baguettes. He sat quietly, finishing a book that he had been reading, while the fire cracked and shifted across the room.

Gwen picked up the shawl that she had been knitting for quite some time and knit several new rows before she sensed that the sauce required tending.

They shared a quiet dinner, sitting side by side in the breakfast nook, as they had for years. Together, they washed the dishes and replaced them one by one on the gingham lined cabinet shelves.

Charles poured each of them a glass of wine. Together they sat, before the fire. Gwen quietly slipped his medications into the palm of his hand. He held her hand and brought it to his chest. He kissed her lips gently and looked deeply into her soul. He thanked her.

Charles drifted off to sleep, holding Gwen's hand, as the tears streamed down her face. He'd awoken early and would sleep forevermore.
She'd given him the greatest gifts, love and peace in the face of an agonizing death. How dearly they had loved.