Happy Hour

by Giuseppe Taurino

When Barbara came home from work it was dusk, the house was dark. In the kitchen, she poured herself a glass of wine, lit a cigarette and leaned into the shadows. The thin stem of a bulbous glass settled neatly between her fingers, she watched the last traces of sunlight slide through the slatted window blinds and bend across the living room floor. She enjoyed being alone, always had — it was something Dan respected, for better or worse, through all eighteen years of their marriage — but it was only since her husband’s death that she’d grown fond of darkness. Part of her wanted to attribute this newfound comfort to some sort of metaphysical explanation — she was recreating the void her husband’s soul now occupied, or some such nonsense — but the truth was much more simple. In the dark she could almost deny the amplified pleasure of solitude which Dan's death had afforded her.

6S

Giuseppe Taurino is a guy living in Austin, with an MFA in Creative Writing and a job in education.