The feeling was one I knew I would never quite accustom myself to. I gazed out the window at the teeming streets below.

“Maria, darling!” the strong voice cut through my thoughts, snapping my attention back the man in front of me. “I already have one mute woman to care for, let’s not make it another.” I believe I was his attempt to make a joke, perhaps to make me feel better, but it had no effect for I still could not help but feel out of place.

“Sorry,” I murmured.

Darling,” his voice softened. “Please tell me what is troubling you.”
A girls wedding day is supposed to be the most magical day of her life, but sitting there in that chair looking at my new husband, I felt anything but magical. But I did love him, so I felt the obligation to conjure up a smile and say, “just thinking.”

“Just as well,” he gave a small sigh. But something told me he was more relieved than concerned, for he often does not desire to talk about his emotions, especially since his first wife’s passing.

Just three months ago his daughter’s mother had passed from lung cancer. It was a tragic death for she treated me well.  She treated me like a friend, not like the housekeeper I was hired to be. And now sitting here in what used to be her chair, I feeling of remorse crept its way into my thoughts. I try to remind myself that what Michael and Jane had was not genuine, but the feeling only grew and overflowed into my heart.

Michael saw the sickening look on my face and he knew what I was thinking about, for it was not the first time. He opened his mouth to say something, to assure me nothing I did was wrong, but I was not in the mood to hear it. So I just shook my head and went back to eating.

The feeling of guilt diminishing, a new thought popped into my head and, it was just as worse as the first. I thought of Michael’s daughter, Sophie. The poor afflicted girl became mute after her mother’s death. I read her lessons and she plays with her toys, but the thirteen-year-old girl shows no emotion.

The doctor diagnosed Sophie with alexithymia, which is the inability to identify and describe emotions in one’s self. He said it was one of the results of her mother’s death along with her becoming mute.

I remember the day when I first moved into my small white room. I was unpacking my things when a little blond head popped through the doorway. The vibrant little girl had asked if she could help. The little girl had looked so eager to help me, the housekeeper, unpack. I was so afraid I would dampen her enthusiasm. She worked so diligently, that on that day, I knew I had found my home.

That evening as I crawled into bed next to my new husband, a thought sprung into my mind. “Michael,” I began.
“Yes darling,” the words managed to escape his lips before he let out a yawn.
“I’m going to go to the market tomorrow to get some things for our trip,” I said remembering that we would be taking a trip to celebrate our becoming a newly wedded couple. Again, all I could think of was that poor girl. She would have to spend a week with distant relatives, for she and Michael had no close relatives.
        
The next morning, when I awoke, I saw a pair of piercing eyes cut into my own.
I just realized that it was harmless Sophie before I let out an earth shattering scream. "I apologize dear," my voice was still recovering. "I must have overslept."

As I made breakfast, Sophie picked up Pando, and stroked the cat soothingly. And something about the way she moved made me feel uneasy. But as we ate our breakfast in peace, a feeling of tranquility was palpable in the room. I thought about how we have all had a great deal of privations, Sophie too, and she became disarming.
Before I came to work for the Hoovers, I was a disconsolate pauper, living a ruinous life. When I came here to America, I could not speak English, I had very little education, I had no friends or family, and I had nowhere to go. Now here I live, in this exorbitant penthouse, filled with amenities and beautiful adornments, married to the man I love.

When Michael finally awoke, I decided it was time to go to the market place. "There is some breakfast waiting for you in the kitchen," I called to him on my way out the door.
When I turned on to Bleecker Street, the carts became visible. People selling their wares made the street all but impassable. The usual friendly chatter that filled the street was replaced with an eerie silence. Ordinarily, New York is buzzing with peoples' kind and happy voices. Perhaps it was the brisk autumn breeze or the early Monday morning, but everyone kept to themselves. I bought the items I needed and made my way back to the penthouse.

When I walked in the door, I heard a crash from the kitchen. As I quickly made my way to the kitchen, a man in dark clothing dashed from the kitchen and shoved me out of his way. As he left through the door I had just come through, he looked back at me with a horrified face. A feeling of languor washed over me and I slowly stood up.
As I looked to the ground, all I could see was red.

"Michael."

It was the only word I managed to whisper as the redness faded into darkness.

I am dancing. I am out with Michael, just months after Jane’s death. Michael tells me so assuredly that I am beautiful, that I almost believe it. He is so jovial and happy and young. I suddenly realize that this is what happiness feels like, this is what love feels like. I was so perplexed about how anyone could be so happy all the time, until I met Michael. I had never been joyful, I had never laughed, I had never lived, I had never loved until I met Michael.

The music is slowing and we have stopped dancing, and my dream is fading into reality. I reach out to grasp what it left of the memory, what is left of my love, what is left of my Michael.
      
The next three hours was a blur, I was numb, I could not grasp my mind around what had happened, around what was happening. I remember catching glimpses of policemen, pulling me from the kitchen floor. I remember seeing the men push me into the station doors. Seeing them lead Sophie to a seat by the door. Hearing them tell her everything would be alright. I remember sitting in an interrogation room, I assume I told them about the intruder, about the body, about the murder.

They did not believe me. They accused me of killing him. The only person I had every loved.
I sat in handcuffs in a locked room when the policemen came rushing in. The explained that the fingerprint results from the body and the knife had come back from the lab. The explained that I was not a match. That I was not guilty. That I was free.

They explained that the fingerprint match was a blond, thirteen-year-old Sophie Hoover.

I slowly stood from my seat and walked out the open door. I walked to the place where Sophie had been sitting. Now she was standing, arms out ready to be cuffed. When I noticed something in her hand, she looked over at me and smiled a haunting smile.

The medics tried to revive her, but they could not. She had plunged a pen into her heart and the policemen did not have time to save her. They asked me which funeral home to take the bodies to. I simply turned around and walked out the door.

I had no one. I had no one to dance with, no one to smile with, no one to love. I had nothing to live for.