He had been the happiest man alive. She had said yes.  At first, being married had seemed like the biggest thing in the world, a massive leap of faith. Discussing even the idea of it seemed to need a level of infinite commitment that broke all boundaries of solitary existence. You now had to think for two. Your existence was tied to another’s. And maybe in the future, if it ever came to that, three. Four were too many in his opinion.

They’d been through so much together. Everything and more. Their families, jobs, friends, faiths and faithlessness, and their lives, all seemed to want to test them. Each threw a new challenge, each an unanticipated complication. There were times when he’d had his doubts, of course he did and he was sure she’d considered them too. But see here is what set them apart in his opinion. It was that despite their many problems, they had always seemed to weather every ripple in their fate. Intricately tying their lives together after that didn’t seem like the impossible prospect it had once been.

The ceremony was a lonely one. Just him, her, their two best friends and an exchange of a lifetime of vows, on a windswept cliff side by the sea. They established their home in the inherited cottage of a late grandfather. Their first night together as a wedded couple they entered the house in their wedding clothes, drenched in the rain, splattered with mud, and shivering from the cold but with spirits high on nothing but resolute joy. All they did was soak in a bathtub together and giggle through a night supplemented by champagne.

They were content with their lives. He would work and she would work. The days he got home early he would cook, and she would do the dishes. They both cleaned on the weekend. They constantly weighed the pros and cons of a dog but never seemed to agree on it. He would take the boat out and she would fish. They made new friends and neighbours together. They were good for each other, they complimented each other. They had many many happy years.

But as with all passivity, the universe had a way of usurping the permanence of things. Turns out that despite having a shared hoard of experiences and history, complacency and lethargy could seep into and rot the foundations of a marriage. Nobody seemed to anticipate that. Nobody got into a life with someone with the idea that “getting bored” was also an option. There is no hate, there is no angst, no disgust. There is just an acute absence of emotion.  Nothing she said anymore brought even a flicker of unexpected thought. It was habitual. It was routine. It was boring. This was unprecedented! This was not how things were supposed to turn out. They had climbed mountains together. They had overcome together. Everything life had thrown at them, they had conquered. Now, the one-time life let them be, he could see no way out. He wanted to work to save it, fight to retain a semblance of the passion he once felt for her, but he couldn’t fathom what that felt like anymore. He didn’t know what he was fighting for! Because there was nothing to overcome together, no big fight to fight, no situation where it was him and her against the world. It was just him and it was her, over and over again. His existence had become monotonous and since their marriage was a part of that, she had too. He still loved her, with all his heart, but not their marriage. How was that love somehow not enough? It couldn’t justify them together in his head. It was like someone had switched the light off and try as he might to furiously flip the switch, there was just no electricity left. He would look back to their first married day together and relive it to the point he would practically travel back in time. He would do anything to feel that way again, be so optimistic about a future they would share.

He decided to tell her. If he had had these thoughts, she had probably thought them too.

Turned out, it hadn’t even occurred to her. She had been happy. She loved their life together. She had no reason to believe anything he told her. She thought he must’ve been joking. But the more he stuck to his side of things the angrier she got. How did anything he say make any sense? Was this some sort of crisis? In what universe was “happy and content” not enough? He retreated into his corner of shame and shut down the conversation as quickly as he could. But that day broke something between them. Every time she would look at him, she would know that he was a dissatisfied soul. That she could no longer be enough for him. Her thoughts tormented her. They no longer spoke to each other unless they had to. Every encounter started feeling forced and the edginess caused them to break out in fights over the pettiest of things. He would now escape the house on his boat without her, she would visit their friends without him. Meals were eaten in sullen silence. The monotony of their existence continued, except now a chilly frost hung over it. A year passed like that and things did not get better. They were hanging together by frayed strings. There was nothing left to salvage after a point.

One evening she informed him that she had been offered work elsewhere. She had decided to take it up. She did not want him to come. It was done. It took a week for her to pack up her things. Not one word was said, not a single sign of protest was made. Both thought they understood that this was how it had to be. They flitted quietly from room to room, occasionally exchanging boxes. They had breakfast together the day she left. Both saw this as the last opportunity to say what they needed to say, but neither seemed to be able to piece anything together. She eventually got up, put her bag on and they turned to face him. He put his arms out and she let him envelop her in a hug. They stood there for what seemed like the longest time, trying to say every unsaid thing they could through that embrace. When he let go, she turned out and ran out, slamming the door behind her.

He sat down, running his hand across the sunshine through the dust where she stood and cried.