prelude

lies, or truths-Teddy POV

The next morning, Teddy awoke to an empty bed. He scanned the room for signs of his wife. It too was empty. He got up and started to get ready for work.

His phone buzzed with a new notification. He tapped the outside screen and saw a text from his wife, Melissa, explaining her absence, she had left earlier and gone into the doctor’s office to be examined from last night’s loss.

He dismissed the message and hopped into the shower, his mind still on the woman from last night. Her soft lips glistening in the moon light. The shadow of her full breasts under her jacket. His body started to tingle from head to toe. His member became erect.

He opened his eyes and looked down, “what is with this woman? I haven’t felt like this in decades!” He closes his eyes again, imagining her lips on his, their bodies dancing in the night light. “Woops… that was faster than normal,” he thought to himself. He jumped out of the shower and looked at the time on his phone, “crap! I’m gonna be late!” He rushed through his normal morning routine and ran down the stairs to his truck outside.

A few hours later his phone rings in his pocket, he pulls out the phone and looks at the screen, it’s his wife. He flips the phone open to answer the call, “Hey, how’d the doctor’s office visit go,” he asked, not really caring about her answer.

“They confirmed that I lost the baby. They said I must have passed all the fetus tissue earlier as nothing was left for a D&C,” she said sadly. “They want me to rest for the remainder of the week at home. I called into work and explained the situation to the lady in personnel. She said that I have enough sick time that I can use for the rest of the week. I’m so sorry honey. I know you really wanted a child.”

He wanted to scream at her through the phone that he hated her and everything that she has put him through, instead he calmly responded, “we can look into fertility clinics and see if there’s anything wrong with either of us. Does that sound like something you would want to try?”

He could hear the hesitation in her voice, “if you really want to try, of course!” Little did she know he would never make it to their first appointment, nor would they ever talk about making a baby again.

“I gotta go as I am on my way to a call. I’ll call you when I’m headed home after work, OK?”

He could hear her breathe a sigh of relief, “that’s fine, I was going to head home and get some sleep. I’ll talk to you later, bye.”

The sound of the empty tone when the call ended was a beautiful sound. Her voice made him cringe every time he had to hear her speak.

When his friends asked why he hasn’t left her yet, his only reply was, “you don’t throw something away just because it’s broken. You try to repair it first.”

As a child he looked up to his grandparents and their, what seemed to be a perfect marriage. He recalls as a teenager asking his grandpa what their secret was and that phrase was his response. A few days later his grandfather passed away in his sleep while he was napping in his favorite rocking chair.

Hours later he finishes his shift and heads home. His mind still wandering to the brunette from last night, “why can’t I stop thinking about her?” He pulls up to the house and looks up and down the street, wondering if she lives in one of the houses nearby. He looks up towards the entrance to his home and sees a young child, at first glance he is unable to tell if it is a girl or boy due to the hoodie on the child’s body, but they turn around. It’s a girl selling cookie dough for her school fund raiser. His wife is at the door talking to the child. He climbs out of his truck and up the stairs to the house, “what are you selling today?” he asks the child.

“I’m selling cookie dough and braided bread dough for my band class, so we can go on a trip..” the little girl replied with a smile.

“Well, you came to the right place, my wife loves pastries,” he said as he slide by his wife and entered the house.

“I’ll let you ladies go about your business, I’m going to get this monkey suit off and shower the day off.” He climbed the stairs up to his room, he paused at the doorway before entering the room, it was a mess. The room looked like a tornado had gone through it. Clothes thrown on the floor, on the bed, and on top of the dressers. The trash was upside down and its contents strewn about the floor. A small pile of shoes was in the middle of the bed. Not knowing what she was up to, he got undressed, placed his duty firearm in its safe, and turned on the shower. He could still hear his wife downstairs talking to the little girl and reviewing her order.

The shower was a welcoming feeling, as it was earlier, he closed his eyes, the brunette appeared immediately in his mind. Her deep brown eyes beckoning him to her. Her soft lips kissing him deeply. The water trickled down his body, tantalizing parts that have laid dormant for many years. He shuttered as he came again.

This was madness, how can he have feelings for a woman he didn’t even know? She was tormenting him without even knowing it. He had to find her, find out who she was, it was his only option to get over this madness that had entered his thoughts.

He opened the shower curtain and to his surprise, his wife was standing in the doorway, “how was work,” she asked.

“It was work. Nothing really crazy happened today, just a few calls, the normal you would expect from a small-town deputy,” he replied. They headed downstairs to begin their nightly ritual; dinner, television shows, and then sleep. He admitted to himself that tonight he was looking forward to sleep. He was hoping, no, anticipating… of dreaming of her again.