The Unofficial Divorce

The silence in the air was thick and suffocating. Words left unsaid hung above their heads, unable to be grasped, for it had been far too long since they had spoken, far too long since they had so much as glanced at one another. The anger and the hatred were there between them, like an electric charge jumping back and forth between their bodies. The love that had once been between them was long gone, gone with the words of anger and resentment, gone with the strand that had once connected their two hearts. It was over. It had been for some time.
They felt resentment from society at the mere thought of divorce. It was unheard of. They would be cast out by their neighbors if they dared to sever their vows. Marriage was a commitment that should never be broken. They knew this. They knew that they would never fit into their worlds again if they were to make such an unimaginable decision. The man turned from his wife, from the woman who had stood by his side for years, and the woman that had been dead to him for almost as long. He made a decision, one that they eventually agreed upon.
They gathered boards and nails, the strongest they could find. They knew what they had to do. They worked together for the first time in a very long time, but they worked in silence. They had become accustomed to the silence. In many ways it was comforting, and in others it was lonely. They worked side by side nailing board after board, building a wall that stretched from floor to ceiling, a wall without a door, without a window. They separated the home they had shared together for so many years. They made it two separate homes, but this was only visible from the inside. The outer walls of the house were deceiving. Society looked at their home from the outside and saw a couple committed to their marriage, while on the inside, the couple lived separately, never speaking to one another again. However, their legal ties remained, a simple piece of paper that had meaning only to the outside world.