Merlot Colored Glasses

            I fiddled with my hair nervously, twisting and winding it around my fingers in the candlelit room. This was the most dressed up I had been in a while. It felt like wearing someone else’s skin, it wasn’t natural.

I guess that means I became too attached to my sweatpants over the last few weeks, which turned into months.

            I took a deep breath, held it, and breathed out. My eyes grazed over the table with the perfectly set dinner plates, still empty. The chair across from me, also still empty. My date was in the bathroom at the moment and he was taking a bit longer than I had expected.

My fingers picked at the lace on my little black dress. This date was the first one I had this whole year, and instead of going to a restaurant like I normally would have, I suggested we have a homecooked meal at my house. Sure, I didn’t know this guy too well, but I wasn’t nervous.

Well, I was nervous, just not about my date. I was nervous about myself.

I heard the toilet flush down the hall. I blushed in anticipation and readied myself to begin the conversation.

            “I’m sorry about that. I couldn’t figure out how to turn on the faucet,” my date said upon entering the room.

            “Yeah, I should have mentioned that. You push the handles up instead of turning them,” I quietly said as my eyes ate up his appearance.

He was attractive. Yes, very much so. Tall, tanned, slightly pink skin, black hair that was a slight bit longer than what most other men would have chosen, and blue eyes. Blue eyes that lit up the whole room and gazed at me right now.

            He smiled, his eyes making little, adorable crinkles at the sides, when he realized how deeply I was looking at him. I was probably giving him the biggest goo-goo eyes he’s ever seen. As he sat down, I forced myself to look away.

            “I brought a bottle of wine,” he said, picking up the bag that sat at the floor next to his chair.

            He pulled out a dark, red bottle and said, “It’s Merlot. I hope that is okay with you.”

I smiled softly at him and pushed my hair back to grab my empty wine glass, “Of course.”

After uncorking the bottle, we were both sitting with a large glass of Merlot in hand. The flavor was wonderful, robust and bold, but still fruity. I couldn’t focus on that though. I was too busy watching my future unfold with this man. His laugh made me laugh. His smile made me smile. His eyes shone brightly in the darkness as my eyes strained to see only his light. Before I knew it, we were chuckling over each other’s stories from growing up, and I forgot about how I felt uncomfortable at first. My dress felt right on me, I wasn’t picking at my hair, heck, I wasn’t even itching to yank off my fake eyelashes.

            Everything felt perfect.

The wine kept flowing. I always had a full glass in my hand. The conversation went smoothly. We didn’t even bother with the food, even though I did cook. It was just me and him. As the night grew longer, the conversation started to slacken. I felt my worry start to rise within me and began reaching for the wine bottle to ease the tension. Grasping the neck of the bottle, I poured myself a full glass.

            “Would you like some more?” I hesitantly suggested.

            He smiled at me, a brilliant smile, and replied, “No, I’m okay. I am just enjoying the time I get to spend with you.”

            Of course, that got me to smile too.

I decided to attempt to close the divide between my date and myself by gently nudging his foot with mine. However, instead of my heel tapping his dress shoe, I hit the table leg instead.

            I grunted in pain because I happened to hit my foot just right, and my heels were open toed, making my big toe the victim. I smiled, embarrassed, through the pain.

            Downing the last bit of my large glass, I began to laugh. Whether it was at myself or not, I still do not know. I felt my eyes water, not from the pain of accidentally hurting myself, but from something else I did not want to acknowledge quite yet.

            “Are you okay?” he asked, his blue eyes, wide with concern and care for me.

            I snorted in disdain and snatched the bottle of wine that sat at the middle of the table, pouring the last of it into my glass.

            “Does it look like I am okay? Is this what an okay person looks like? Please, I would love to know,” I said as my bitterness and resentment came rushing right out of me.

            My date sat silently across from me, still looking as handsome as ever.

I chucked the last of the Merlot down my throat and lowered my head into my awaiting hands. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, trying to shove the sobs that were rising in my throat back down.

            I lifted my head and opened my eyes to look at him and his image blurred in my vision.

            “I am not okay,” I whispered to him slowly.

            The image of him flickered before my eyes.

            I felt my breath hitch in my throat as the tears started to leak out of my eyes.

            “I am not!” I shrilly screeched at him, jumping up out of my chair, wine glass still in hand, in a sudden sit of anger and energy.

            I grabbed the wine bottle before turning my back to him and stalking to the other side of the room in a heated frenzy. My hands shook as I struggled to set down my half empty wine glass and top it off with what was in the bottle, and the anger only increased when I realized that the wine bottle was empty.

            My vision turned as dark as that Merlot was as I tossed the bottle behind me to let it shatter to the floor, and as that bottle shattered, I felt something inside me shatter as well.

            “I am not okay because you’re not really here,” I breathed out in one deep, gut-wrenching sigh of despair.

            I turned around, hoping against all hope that I would be wrong and that he would be here, that he would be here so we could celebrate the anniversary of our first date together, and that we could be as happy together as we once were.

            My eyes did not find his blue ones though. All I saw was an empty table with three empty bottles of Merlot on it and two sets of dinnerware completely unused. My eyes watered as I turned my face towards the last picture I had of him and I before the car accident that took his life. I picked up the photo by its frame and hugged it to my chest before throwing myself onto the couch beside me.

            “I am not okay because I miss you and there’s nothing I can do about it,” I whispered to only myself before falling asleep in my dark, candlelit room with my arms still tightly wrapped around that picture.