A home
Four walls, a roof, and some windows
Just a place to run when my working day is through
They say home is where the heart is
If the exception proves the rule I guess that's true
Not a night goes by I don't dream of wandering
Through the home that might have been
And I listened to my pride
When my heart cried out for you
Now everyday I wake again in a house that might have been
A home
A home *
It was the flower carvings on the door that drew her to the place, even though she knew it was beyond their means. Still they bought it, and for a while they were happy, and then the strain of keeping up with the bills took it's toll. He was working two jobs, never home, and she was still in school, studying, working or sleeping, usually on a schedule opposite from his.
She noticed when he began to drift, felt it when he became detached, but she loved him, so she gave up a chance to study abroad doing an international affairs internship, and stayed home, working her nothing job so she could finish the year, and meet her half of the mortgage.
It was the flower carvings on the door that had drawn her to the place, but by the end, she saw withered weeds when she came home, and an empty house that was bleak and lonely, instead of filled with love.
*”Home,” Dixie Chicks
This bit of flash fiction was inspired by a song suggested by E.