She had stood by his hospital bed, wearing a summer dress printed with skulls grinning of the dead. Pretty in a dumpy, pot belly sort of way; her deep eyes glistened in the hospital light. She held the cold rails tightly, smiling with crooked teeth and a tired, sagging face.

He did not speak, and he did not smile as he had lain with his gown draped over his bony frame like a table cloth. Handsome in an immaciated invalid sort of way. Sunken eyes and cheeks; he smelled like urine and vomit. He slowly reached through the tangle of wires and tubes keeping him alive, held her hand and sighed.

They had listened to the rain patter on the window and knew they would be together, eating strawberries, dipped in chocolate or cream cheese, or lightly dusted in sugar.

When she became pregnant, her favorite strawberry dip was tartar sauce, and the taste grew on him over time.

During a winter in the Midwest, she told him to slow down, right before the truck swerved in their path on the snow-dusted, glistening-black highway. He tapped the brakes lightly, and the car started gliding to the formidable treeline along the roadside. He turned away, and the car spun around, and around. Their four year old kid in the back seat laughed and laughed, having a rocking good time.