The Color of Leaving

The iphone sat on the kitchen counter, its screen cycling through photos she hadn't looked at in eight months. Maya's thumb hovered over the device, her breath catching as David's face materialized—laughing, head tilted back, that crease between his eyebrows she used to trace with her finger. She'd been running from this moment since the funeral. Literally running: six miles every morning, lungs burning, legs pumping, outpacing the grief that snapped at her heels like a persistent dog.

Barnaby whined at her feet, his golden coat duller now, his ribs showing. David's dog. Their dog. She'd forgotten to feed him again yesterday. The guilt was a physical weight in her chest, heavier than any she'd felt on those morning runs.

An orange rolled across the counter—a remnant from grocery shopping she couldn't remember doing. She caught it reflexively. David's hands had peeled oranges for her every Sunday morning, the citrus scent filling their tiny apartment, his fingers leaving sticky kisses on her cheeks when she complained. She hadn't eaten an orange since.

Her thumb pressed the screen. A voicemail from the night before the accident played through the kitchen's silence.

"Hey, hon. Pick up some oranges? I'm thinking tomorrow morning—"

The message cut off. Maya's legs gave out. She slid to the floor, Barnaby immediately pressing his warm weight against her, his whine rising to a howl that echoed the sound tearing from her own throat. The orange slipped from her fingers and rolled across the floor, coming to rest against David's running shoes by the door, still laced with the double-knots he'd tied that morning.

She wasn't running anymore. For the first time in eight months, Maya stayed still, let the grief catch her, wrap around her like Barnible's warm body, and finally, finally, she cried until she was empty.