Read Matter of Choice for Free Online

the refrigerator and reached for a container of orange juice. He guzzled the citrus straight from the container, wiping a sleeve across his mouth and returned the container into the fridge.
    She leaned against the countertop, and watched as he took an apple from the bin and closed the refrigerator door. “It’s our house, Greg. I’m your wife, remember?”
    He shrugged and bit into the fruit. “I don’t remember ever being married. I guess you’re pretty enough.” The words grew muffled as Greg chewed. “But you’d think I’d remember being married.”
    Shannon nodded, the smile vanished as she turned to wipe the counter with a damp towel left over from the cleaning spree. “Yeah, I suppose you would.”
    “Ah, don’t be sad about it. You don’t have to leave. If you say you live here, and that I know you, I guess there’s no harm.” Greg yawned with a wide mouth and a loud groan. “I’m tired. Make yourself comfortable. I’m going to go upstairs to bed.” He walked to the door in the left corner of the room, opened it to expose a spacious pantry. With a nervous chuckle, he closed the door and turned to Shannon. “Guess I’m not remembering anything right now. Do you know where the bedroom is?”
    Shannon nodded, but didn’t bother to look at him. The tears she promised never to shed again were threatening to rebel. There was no allowance for a peep show into her pain. He’d show no sympathy or remorse. That wasn’t what she needed anyway. “Down the hallwa y, up the stairs, to the left.”
    “Thanks, doll.” Greg headed towards the hall, but turned to face Shannon. “You seem like a sweet gal. I guess I’d like to marry someone like you someday.”
    “Mmm …”
    He disappeared down the hall, and Shannon threw the towel down, shaking her head. His maid? Sure, his maid, his nurse, his doormat. His wife in title only. Why would he remember their vows? It wasn’t the role she played any longer. Not in his mind, at least. And aside from promises she stubbornly h eld to, not in practice either.
    Yet, she thought as she hung the rag over the faucet and turned off the lights, he did call her a term of endearment, something Greg hadn’t done since before the accident. At least that was something. She was like someone he’d marry someday. The foggy compliment was more than she got most days. Who knew? Maybe it w as the start of something more.
    Shannon flicked off the light switch just as a glint of silver against a floorboard caught her attention. Brows furrowed, she stepped towards it and bent down, wrapping long fingers around a delicate bracelet, the clasp broken. Swiping the lights back on, she studied it for a moment, recognizing it quickly. Lauren’s. “Hmm, must have left it here the last time we had dinner together.” She thought for a moment. The dinner was almost two weeks ago. Shrugging, she tucked it in her pants pocket. She’d take it into work tomorrow, her friend had probably been searching all over for it, not realizing it fell off.
    Shannon left the kitchen to cross a Persian rug resting against the hardwood floors of the dining room into a two-story foyer with winding staircase and overhead crystal chandelier. She paused at the staircase, hand resting on the banister as she stared up the steps, knowing all that waited was an empty king-sized bed in a bedroom suite she used to share with her husband. Now he slept down the hall in the guest suite, sometimes alone, sometimes not. The sometimes not happened only when she wasn’t home, which helped a little. Not nearly enough, but at least she didn’t have to see it.
    It was bad enough knowing, and hearing about it, through the Hudson Valley grapevine.
    His words played again in Shannon’s mind, “Are you the maid?”
    Right now, maybe.
    But someday. Someday the amnesia would have to relinquish its hold on his mind. She would be Greg’s wife again. His best friend, his life partner.
    At the top of the stairs, she looked down the