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I intended to write something hot and sexy and funny. But as all writers know, what comes out is what comes out. Here's my dark fictional story, Appearances Can Be Deceiving. Grab a Kleenex (or not, your choice.)
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The hubs and I sometimes blackly joke about how he’s my Fire Sale Husband, and I’m his Fire Sale Wife. People assume it has something to do, in an obscure way, with his job as a firefighter. We simply smile when people ask, and say, “Something like that.”
Or they think it’s related to his scorching hotness - and Mark is smokin' hot. Not just my opinion. He and the guys at his station do a charity calendar each year, and his picture is always one of the most popular ones among the wanna-be groupies.
I’ve never told anyone the truth, but I can trust you, can’t I? The reality is that we’re both damaged goods. We met in group therapy, because we’re baby-killers.
Technically, not.
I was driving home from work, through a nice, tree-lined neighborhood. Woman was doing the typical multi-tasking crap - pushing a baby stroller, walking her dog, and yapping on the cellphone. Suddenly her dog spotted another dog across the street and yanked her and the stroller right in front of my car. I jammed on the brakes right away, but it was too late. Even though I wasn’t going very fast, the car hit the stroller, the baby’s head hit the street...
I’m sorry for crying again. Even though the other pedestrians testified it wasn’t my fault, even though I was fully exonerated by the police report, I can’t help replaying it in my mind, trying to find a way I could have made it end differently.
Her name was Kayleigh.
Mark and his stationmates were called to a fire at a condo. Beautiful and well-kept - on the outside. Grandma Hoarder, her daughter, and the grandbaby lived there. The daughter was at work, and the baby was asleep upstairs in his crib. The fire started in the kitchen; a stack of papers tumbled onto the stove or something. A neighbor called 911, and Grandma managed to crawl out, but the captain took one look inside and wouldn’t let his crew enter. By the time Mark calmed down the grandmother enough to find out exactly where the baby’s room was and got a ladder up there, little Christopher had died of smoke inhalation.
Mark found him, carried him down the ladder and did CPR until the paramedics took over. He still thinks if he’d gotten there ten minutes earlier, even five...
We make a handsome couple. We own a nice house, and now we’re expecting our first child. People envy us and our charmed life. We’re so lucky, they say. They don’t know that Mark and I take turns sobbing into each other’s arms when the nightmares come.
We’ll find out the gender in a few weeks. If she’s a girl, we’re going to name her Kayleigh Christine. If he’s a boy, Christopher Kay.
Your thoughts?
(Edited to add, this is fiction - though it could happen, IMO)
And it's a blogfest - please click the link and join in, it's not too late!
(Edited to add, this is fiction - though it could happen, IMO)
And it's a blogfest - please click the link and join in, it's not too late!
