Goodbye, Sweetheart

Another Sophie bit, inspired by a prompt I saw on Pinterest a few years ago.

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She still wore the ring. People would tell her there wasn’t any reason to because he was gone, but Sophie still wore her engagement ring.

At times though, she’d start to take it off because she thought she was ready to move forward, but then she would change her mind halfway through and keep it on.

One day, she didn’t change her mind. One day, every picture, every little note, everything that reminded her of Justin went into a cardboard box.

Except for the ring, which went into her keepsake chest. For a long moment before, she held it in her hands and studied it, the day he’d asked her to marry him so clearly and vividly playing back in her mind.

Then it was resting atop the covered inherited veil she would never wear. The dress was already long gone; she had given it to another bride years before.

She taped the box shut, chin trembling. “Goodbye, sweetheart,” she whispered. She shoved the box onto the shelf in her closet, concealing it from sight with bedsheets and other things that were stored up there.

And she cried herself to sleep.

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©H.S. Kylian 2018

(Critiques are welcome and appreciated!)

This post was last updated February 15, 2020