An old piece of prose I wrote a few years ago.
The silence between us stretched across the dinner table, a wide expanse of desert — crackling, dry, devoid of life. The silence was painful. Thoughts and emotions of love and reconciliation lingered in the air, struggling to travel across the plain but evaporating because unsaid words can never be heard by the listener. I looked down, trapped in silence. Trapped in this deep chasm that I brought us down, spiraling out of control with no visible way out. I studied the planes of his face out of the corner of my eyes, my heart aching. Why could I not articulate myself correctly? Why, with every word I actually uttered, did I drive us further apart? Every syllable yet another nail hammered into a coffin. My character flaw, to take something whole and good and rip it apart with my own thoughts and words. The silence was suffocating. Seconds ticked by, every second the death knell continued to ring. I looked down at my hands, fumbling, fidgeting, fingering the wedding ring on my hand, twisting and turning it as if it were a puzzle. Perhaps if I twisted it the right way, it would fix things. Fix us. Fix me. I started. And stopped. And looked up and started again. The words were dry in my throat. My heart beat wildly. What could I say that had not already been said? What could I say…
I stood up and left.
