Nor Death Do Us Part

The offer was always tempting. Peace. Finally. But Harold Alden shook his head as he did every year.

He looked over at Mrs Alden taking her earrings off. The blue tin of cream and a hairnet waited for her on the dresser.

“I promised her on our wedding day,” he said, watching the tremor in her hand as she dabbed cream on a papery cheek, “that we’d never spend a night apart. I can’t.”

The golden radiance in the corner of the room faded gently away.

Sighing, Harold Alden approached his wife of sixty years. As she reached through him and picked up her hairnet, he whispered, “And I’ll wait here as long as you need, my love.”