This is my entry for the Halloween 2021 contest! It's a little spooky, and a little melancholy; no blood, guts, or gore if that is not your thing. It's a love story featuring fully consensual sex between adult characters.
If you like it, please consider voting. And Happy Halloween! - Lily -
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The last fingers of daylight were drifting through sparsely garlanded branches as she walked toward the little cottage.
The air had begun to crisp, and she felt a tiny shiver drift across the small of her back. The leaves that still clung stubbornly to their branches brought a fiery orange relief against a leaden grey sky. Those that had surrendered carpeted the earth; the ones covering the stone path she had travelled so often were swept up and off the ground in rhythm with her practiced steps. She was singular in her purpose.
He had built this cottage for her.
She lived in a larger house in the city now. The cottage was only half an hour away, give or take, depending on the snarls of the city traffic. For the past ten years, her friends had tried to talk her into selling the cottage, but over time they just shook their heads in bemused wonderment.
"The property value has skyrocketed," they would say to each other over coffee or wine. "Why is she still hanging on to it? She's let everything else go and moved on, hasn't she? It's not healthy, after all these years." Her friends loved to discuss what was and wasn't healthy, especially as it related to other people.
When she lost him, she thought the grief would swallow her. He died young of an old man's disease, his healthy, muscular body disintegrating before her eyes. There were treatments, of course, but they could only slow the relentless criminal that crawled through his body, stealing his strength. She fed him and bathed him and held him and loved him until one day he was gone and she was gone too, the best and brightest part of her.
She reached into her purse, pulled out the key. The key fob was a gag gift she had put in his stocking on their first Christmas. It said "When life gives you lemons, grab salt and tequila." It slid perfectly into the lock, as if not a day had passed, and she flipped the deadbolt and pushed the door open.
The smell of the cedar planking rushed into her nose, making her suddenly feel heady and unstable. She should have known, she should have been ready for it, but she always forgot until it was too late. "It's always like this," she told herself, as she reached out to touch the wall, to ground herself.
The cottage was small, modest, just a bedroom, and a small living room off of the galley kitchen. They had lived there the entire time they were married. It was inconvenient at times, when they visited friends for dinner parties and had to drive home sober afterwards, down the dark, twisting roads. Sometimes the space felt cramped, and they snipped at each other. But mostly it felt like a refuge, a lovers bower, their own little mismatched, well worn piece of paradise. Until the sickness had invaded.
She unburdened herself of a large canvas bag and a mesh bundle of kindling and firewood. She shrugged off her wool coat, draping it over the coat hook by the door, and went to work. There was no rush, she always left plenty of time for ritual.
She took a flashlight out of her purse and descended the basement stairs to the fusebox. The central breaker gave a hefty click, and then the cottage began to hum with electricity.
Returning upstairs, she went to the door and brought the tote to the kitchen and placed it on the counter. Out of it, she pulled a bottle of red wine and a bottle of tequila and set them both on the counter. She had bought them on the first of the month; there was no reason to buy them so early, of course, other than the recognition that another year had passed and she could feel her growing heat and the excitement of the inevitability of this night.
For a moment, she let her fingers drift across the smooth surface of the bottles, feeling their rigid smooth hardness. She shivered, closing her eyes for a moment, willing her breath to steady.
It was starting early this time. Or was it just her imagination?
She exhaled forcefully, to clear her head. Then, reaching into the canvas bag, she pulled out the stack of old newspapers, and then went back to the front door to fetch the bundle of firewood.
Kneeling in front of the living room fireplace, she began the process of building the fire. He always asked her to build the fire. She knew he could build fires just as well, perhaps even better than she could. But he knew she loved to do it, and he knew she loved being good at it.
The process was methodical: crumple the newspapers to form a base, use the smaller sticks to build the log cabin above and around it. She used half of the kindling, then lay half of the larger logs to the side to add to the fire once the rest caught.
The match trembled in her hand as a wave of desire shook her. She closed her eyes and counted backwards from five, to bring herself back. Her hand, almost of its own accord, struck the match against the flint of the box, and she lit the papers, watching the kindling catch. The larger logs, she then lay carefully on top of the structure, watched them for a moment, licked by the flames underneath, She took the remaining wood and newspapers into the bedroom.
"Two fireplaces?" she had laughed when he showed her the plans. "In this tiny place? You're crazy! It's going to look ridiculous from the outside!"
"Oh, you'll thank me," he said, taking her into her arms "on all those freezing winter nights we have in store out here. Besides," he slid his hands down her back and over her ass, "It's my dream to fuck you in front of a fire in our little cabin. Wouldn't it be nicer on a soft, comfortable bed than on the floor in the living room?"
In their little cottage, the desire for comfort was nothing compared to their desire for each other. There were many nights when they had fucked for hours on the floor in front of the living room fire, laughing, moaning, changing positions. On the floor, in the kitchen, in the bedroom; she couldn't think of a centimetre of that cabin where they hadn't loved and loved and loved each other.
She thought of this as she built the fire in the bedroom. She thought of the night that he had come home from his crappy job to report that he had gotten a raise. It was a tiny raise, she knew that now, he was still so undervalued back then. But he was so happy that his mouth opened after he had kissed her hello and he trailed his gently down her neck, over her breast.
