Scars

Scars

Harry traced his left hand on a piece of loose leaf paper.  Looking at his wedding ring he noticed the scar that cut across his hand from his small finger to the base of his thumb.  He looked at his watch.  It was five minutes fast, and he was always early.  He got up from his desk and looked over the top of the cubicle at the heads hung, reading and typing.  He picked up his briefcase, put on his suit coat, and went to the glass doors outlined in slate with gold handles.  He left.  In the elevator he saw her.  She had brown hair, a checkered blue and red cotton dress.  She was chewing gum.  She smelled like powder and spearmint.  They got out on the garage level and he followed her to her small sedan.  She reached into her purse for her keys, unlocked the door, and heard the noise behind her.  He pushed her in the car and held her arms against the passenger seat.  He pulled her dress up, forced her underwear to the side, and unzipped his brown slacks.  She scratched his face with her left hand that had come free while he unzipped with his right hand, her gold ring slicing a single line on his cheek.  He stopped and looked at his own left hand, after he had completely set her free.  The gold ring reflected the blood that dripped down his face and what would be another scar in a few weeks.  Harry walked to his green sedan with his shirt untucked; she lay in her blue sedan catching her breath unable to speak.
He got in his car checked his rearview mirror, and drove to his suburban home with an immaculate lawn.  He got home before his wife did.  She knew he was always early.  He filled the sink, washed his face and watched the blood swirl down the drain.  His left hand trembled, and he turned off the faucet.  The front door shut.  She was home.  He left the bathroom looking in the mirror to see if the scratch was that noticeable.  It wasn’t.  He came into the kitchen where she was standing eating an apple, and drinking a glass of lemonade.  Her dress danced on the tile of the kitchen floor, the cotton blowing in the breeze from the open window.  She looked like she came from the country as she ate the apple and sipped the lemonade.  She washed her hands.  Her hands had become sticky from the juice of the apple.  She took off her wedding ring and set it on the ledge of the window above the sink.  She lathered her hands, and he watched as the suds swirled down the drain.  She tied back her hair with a red ponytail holder.  Her ring left a tan line or her left ring finger he noticed through the thin strands of brown.  She sat at the kitchen table, made of solid oak and read the mail.  The sun shone through the glass door, leading to their stained, wood deck.  Her brown hair reflected the sun and her blue and red checkered cotton dress left a shadow on the tile next to her.  She put another piece of spearmint gum in her mouth.
“People at work really are ignorant,” she said.
Harry smiled sadly and went to change into something more comfortable.  He noticed the scar that cut across his left hand from his little finger to the base of his thumb as he took off his clothes.  His eyes traced the scar. The scars littered his entire body, as they did on his wife’s.  She came in behind him and they both looked into the mirror at their reflections.