Curtain Up

In my creative writing class last year we were also required to write a short story. My end product ended up being about 24 pages. I loved the writing process so much while writing my fiction and was very happy with the end result. For this class, I would love to re-work that original story for our short story assignment. For the Curtain Up homework assignment I will write a portion of one of the scenes from my story titled Reflection.

How do you measure the success of a woman? The significance of her life? Through her family, her husband, her children, her home? Oh, did I believe in these words once. I aspired to be these words; to exemplify these words. Married by 24, my first child by 25. A beautiful home with blue shutters in a quaint development in the suburbs. It was always my plan, no second thoughts about it. These words were more important to me than my own dreams, ambitions, aspirations, goals… I forgot the meaning of those words a long, long time ago. I lost myself, who I really was, a long, long time ago. I was fine with this too, completely fine; until I realized I had nothing. I have nothing…
I am a 39-year-old woman. I am in a loveless marriage. I have been married for twelve years and my husband has been having an affair for seven of them. I knew this for the past five years but I chose to do nothing about it. I’m not completely sure why. I do know that it gives me a sense of freedom, less pressure, a release in a way. I have no children, we just could never decide if it was the right time and now it’s too late. I wanted to be married by 24 but 27 was when it happened, children by 25 but it never happened. I live in an enormous home, which I spend most of my time in, alone. I write ads for a store catalog so I work from home. My husband travels a lot, or so he says. I don’t really ask questions. So, I am 39 years old and I am alone. I am far away from my family. I miss my family, my mother…
I cry myself to sleep, more so to sickness, night after night. I wait until my husband is sleeping and I go into the bathroom, lay on the floor, my face staring up at the ceiling, and I cry. I sob. I cry so hard and for so long I go blank after awhile, completely blank. My head, my mind, is empty. I forget where I am and why I’m there. I cry until I can’t cry anymore, I cry until it is physically impossible for one more tear to fall from my lifeless eyes. When I reach this point, this state of emptiness, I go back to bed and fall asleep in about 10.5 seconds. I look forward to this process all day. I love crying. It helps me; it helps me feel nothing.


***This is the portion of my story where the reader is introduced to one of the two main characters named Erinn.