The Mystery of Love

Love Never Dies True love is not over when it is over but gets deeper inside the heart of those who stay alive. Since early morning, it had been raining, making it hard to spend a day in a graveyard. Yet, Ricardo had been sitting on a bench for an hour, looking at Agatha’s grave and wishing her a happy Valentine’s Day. He’d brought her a box of bittersweet chocolate, a bouquet of roses, a red wine bottle, and lunch. He was like, Hey, so what! We still may celebrate. During the glamorous days when Agatha was alive, the best Valentine’s Day gift they used to give was the gift of uninterrupted time together, swinging with their love. They did not need to leave the house to celebrate but spent the entire day thanking God they’d been together. Ricardo put the bouquet and the box of chocolate on the grave. Held the bottle of wine from the bottom and exposed the label to ensure that Agatha saw he had brought what she favored. “Here’s to my wife. The noblewoman. The one who’d seen my best and worst and wished I got what I wanted rather than what I deserved.” Ricardo poured a little wine on the grave and then drank straight from the bottle. “You must be missing Max,” he addressed Agatha in her grave, knowing how much she used to love that lovely dog and considered him their son. “Max couldn’t make it; he’d broken his leg and needed to rest.” Ricardo kneeled, took a long sip, and looked through the graves, wondering what the wisdom behind the puzzle of death and life was. Finishing half the bottle in no time was terrific. The excellent wine put Ricardo in the mood for a dance. He searched YouTube on his cell phone and played Julio Iglesias’ songs. “Come on, honey.” He reached out to the grave and closed his eyes, feeling his wife in his two arms. “You smell like heaven, Agatha.” He remembered their honeymoon’s glorious and sweet time. They’d spent half of it staring into each other’s eyes and the rest of the time walking on the beach. Ricardo was now absolutely soaked in the rain but didn’t feel it. He was more absorbed in the warm feeling of the moment, remembering how they had been having fun together. They sort of get home, open a bottle of wine, and go, “yay! Just us, let’s celebrate.” On the winter’s long nights, they watched Netflix and ate popcorn. Sometimes when they were hungry and did not know what to eat, they invented new dinner recipes, most of which ended up in the wastebasket. They considered that as fun-and very often behaved like kids and played jumping games, memory games, hide-and-seek, and whatever occurred to their minds. Their joy was not only indoor. They loved dining out, stuffing themselves with a lot of fancy food, driving for long hours, and listening to the best songs in the world. As for the course of life, nothing was perfect. Ricardo and Agatha had adored their intimate relationship but, as bad luck, missed the reality that good intimacy did not always guarantee good sex. The same elements that nurture love are sometimes the same things that stifle desire. Agatha had been an actual caregiver; she’d cared for Ricardo much as he was her child. Therefore, he’d felt like being with his beloved mother, not with a woman he enjoyed taking to bed. Ricardo had suffered the need for erotic satisfaction. For a while. Eventually, he cheated on Agatha. Now that she had passed, his guilt was killing him. …… A few days after Agatha had died, Ricardo had dared to search for her memoir book and read it. It stunned him to discover that Agatha knew he was cheating on her, suffered a lot, and cried in silence. He dipped into her memoir and read: (I knew that from the smell of Ricardo’s clothes after coming back late at night. That hurt and made me cry, but I’ve never confronted my husband. I convinced myself he was a kid, and it was unfair to stop him from playing around.) …… The voice of Julio Iglesias was now all over the graveyard, or that was how Ricardo felt listening to a song talking about being crazy for feeling so lonely, feeling so blue. The music took him high, and Like in a dream, he felt Agatha rise out of her grave, affectionate, amicable, and enigmatic as always, and get closer to him to talk. Her voice sounded inside his head. “Hi, how are you doing?” Then she asked, “Do you eat well?” He freaked out but was happy to talk with his wife. “I do, I do.” He took a long sip from the bottle. “Of course I do.” “Don’t lie. I can feel how slim you’ve become.” Ricardo pointed to the lunch box he brought and left it on the bench, “Look, I have a lunch box there.” “What is in it?” “Chinese rice…I know you love Chinese rice…come…come, let us eat together like the old days.” “You know I can’t eat anymore. I’m dead.” Ricardo felt his skin shrinking. yes, she’s dead, he thought and was about to wake up from his illusion, but still wanted a little more time. “Fine, let us have one more dance.” “Sorry, honey. It’s time I go back to my grave. To where I belong.” Agatha’s ghost said and disappeared. At that dark moment, Ricardo was standing alone amid a rainstorm, hungry and soaked, wanting to talk with someone about his sorrow. Still, there was no one alive in the graveyard. He thought about his dog, Max, waiting for him. ‘A good boy.’ So he went on getting ready to leave, picked up the lunch box, and headed to the house to eat with Max and tell him all that had happened today. _______________________ ______________