Aftertaste

He put the keys in lock and clicked the door open. Warm and stale air in his apartment greeted him like a loyal dog waiting for him. He loosened his tie and threw himself onto the bed. He stretched an arm to reach a mess of unwashed clothes, extricated the remote of air conditioner and switched it on almost robotically.

His head hurt terribly. Pinching his nose bridge in frustration, he tried to shun the thoughts that had flooded his brain since afternoon when he had bumped into her unexpectedly.

She had aged a little than when she had left him. Something died inside him seeing her smile for a reason that had nothing to do with him. And then she had raised her glance up only to catch his sight. Her smile had faltered.

His heart had beaten frantically. The Butterfly Feeling in his stomach had never died though it had been years since she had last kissed him. Arch of her eyebrows, huge forehead that he had always kissed, small nose that he used to tease her for and curls in her hair... None of those had changed and none of those belonged to him anymore.

Her fists had curled in balls and next second she had left looking straight ahead, putting her sunglasses on as if nothing had happened.

He had stood rooted there, with stinging eyes and a heavy heart.

That alluring smile with which she used to wink at him years ago, rubbing of her soft cheeks against his stubble, her slender fingers entwined in his pudgy ones while they walked and the indifferent glance she had thrown at him today... Everything ran like a slide show before his closed eyes.

He let a drop of tear slide quietly onto the bed and got up.

A finely blended, old bottle of whisky. He had saved it for special occasion.

Nothing was as special as this one.

He poured a peg for himself and gulped it down at one go. Whether his foodpipe burned because of a lump that had formed at his throat or because of whisky, he couldn't tell.

Like finely blended whisky, she had left an aftertaste.

Bittersweet.