Word Count: 222
Morning sun cut through the kitchen. She flicked off the radio. Put their empty coffee mugs into the sink. “Where were you?” she asked. “I know where I was. Where were you?”
He turned quickly at her question. She had asked him out of simple curiosity. Yet the fear struck him that somehow she knew.
He stared at her slim silhouette. His life up through the time that he met her, the sacrifices he made, their life together these last four years in the city. It all collided and rumbled inside the moment as she turned to face him when he didn’t reply.
He could lose everything just when he thought it was all behind him. When he turned his own back on all he’d believed in and held dear. A furious love burst inside him. For her, for before her, for him.
She had a quizzical look without humor. Her eyebrows bent into a vague frown.
He came up close to her, held her face in his hands, slowly kissed her. Drew back and looked fearfully into her eyes. He realized he’d have to make sacrifices, have to give up all that he loved once again.
“Were you here, in the city,” she asked as his hands slid down to her throat, when the planes hit the Towers? forever remaining unsaid.
