"Another Valentine's Day," mumbled Millie as she slowly walked toward the diner to start her shift, "now I can spend the next six hours smiling, wishing everyone a happy Valentine's Day."
There wasn't much to be happy about in Millie's life when at age fifty two, she worked two jobs to make ends meet and save for retirement.
She did grin for an instant when she remembered the gift left by a secret admirer for the last 2 years; a little heart shaped box containing six scrumptious chocolates truffles.
The candy was always accompanied by a single red rose, and a handwritten note card with "Millie" on the front and "from your loving admirer" on the back beautifully written in a flowing calligraphy.
Both years in the same writing and always left at an empty table. Millie made a mental note to watch her usual customers to find this admirer.
Millie didn't always feel this way about life or Valentine's Day in particular. She use to cheerfully embrace each day as a new and exciting experience, and Valentine's Day made her laugh thinking about some of the outrageous gifts Tom, her husband of 25 years, had purchased because some cute saleswoman said his wife would love it.
It was Valentine's Day, four years ago, that her life suddenly fell into the abyss.
~*~
Tom was a laborer in the trades before they even met. Work was slow like it was most winters and he was on unemployment. What was different about that year, now that Millie thought about it, was he didn't go out and pick up the cash jobs like he did every winter.
Instead, he told her he was going to the labor hall and wait for work.
He would usually return home smelling of beer and smoke from sitting around the labor hall's next door bar sometime before she left for her second job at the grocery store. The last few weeks though, he hadn't come home before she left. She had meant to ask him about it, but always forgot by the time she did see him.
It was after ten when she got home from work that Valentine's Day night. It was strange because all the lights were off and Tom always left the front porch and Kitchen lights on for her.
She unlocked the door; flipped on the light switch and came to a complete stop in stunned silence with her mouth hanging open.
The TV and Tom's recliner was missing in the living room and the complete dining room set of her grandmothers was gone.
She found a quickly scribbled note on the kitchen table from Tom saying he was leaving. Their bedroom set was gone, and her clothes just dumped in a corner of the bedroom. The bedroom set in the guest room was untouched.
It was like someone, definitely not Tom, was picking what to take. Evidently they didn't cook because all the dishes and cookware were still in the cupboard.
Millie saw the blinking light on the answering machine and pressed play.
"Millie," said an upset voice, "this is Marge at the credit union. Please call back as soon as possible. This is extremely important."
Millie walked through the house in a daze as the gravity of the situation struck her. She firmly held Tom's note in her hand wondering what she did to make him want to leave. Somehow, she managed to curl up on the bed in the guest room and cry herself to sleep still clutching that note.
She woke up dreaming she heard a phone ringing until she recognized Tara's voice from the diner leaving a message on the answering machine. Tara was worried something was wrong because Millie had never been late for work.
Millie called Tara back to tearfully explain why she would need a couple of days off.
The sadness quickly changed to anger as she remembered walking in to the credit union and talking to Marge.
