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Dreaming of Encores

Olivia dropped a cardboard box outside the closet door, not wanting to attend to the daunting task of going through his things. She avoided it for weeks believing that he might come back to haunt her if she disposed of anything. His things were so valuable and important. 'Don't move my things!' He bellowed, fists pounding the desk. Remnants of Harold littered the house like the scattered ashes of a spilled urn. Everything in the house was coated in a layer dead husband dust. She winced and opened the closet door with the ghostly echo of Harold's angry voice at her back.

While Olivia thumbed through lifeless clothes on skeletal hangers she smelled him. Her stomach turned and she covered her nose with the back of her hand. A bad taste filled her mouth. The clothes reeked of cologne. Even the dry cleaner could not remove the smell. Many other women recognized that scent. Many of them attended his funeral, much to her dismay. It amused her that they seemed so much more upset than his new widow. She deduced that they were more likely distressed at the loss of their kept status. To Olivia the smell was a foul odor. It was cloying and the putrid taste of it gagged her. Harold was a stinking, arrogant bastard. A small justified smile played across her lips. She pushed it away with a slight brush of her delicate hand. She knew it improper to think ill of the dead.
She arranged the clothes, filing them in orderly stacks in the bottom of the box like a human sorting machine. Olivia forced herself through the motions. There were no tears, no happy memories - only the monotonous movement of her tired, aching muscles. Resentment welled up inside her as she fought with a shirt tangled on a bony plastic hanger. It jerked free with a sharp snap and she stuffed the last of the clothes and suits into the heavy box. Olivia taped the box shut and then lugged forty years down the stairs and out to the car. The three-car garage echoed when she slammed the trunk.
Harold's wooden valet box always occupied the same place, on top of the chest of drawers. Olivia pulled it down expecting it to be heavy and cumbersome. It was surprisingly light to have carried such importance to him. She glanced over her shoulder before she examined the contents. A monogrammed Zippo lighter. A personalized Mont Blanc fountain pen. His father's engraved pocket watch. Even his things demonstrated his conceited nature. Olivia closed the valet without touching anything and rested it in her lap.

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