House on the Beach
By Free Spirited One aka Cleo
Rating: PG
Summary: Sean Vetters possible thoughts looking at the house he shared with his wife.
Disclaimer: I own none of the characters. This is solely for recreational purposes earning nothing but some simple pleasure.
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Sitting in the sand, watching the sun go down over the Pacific ocean through the reflection off broken glass, Sean Vetter tried to build the courage to enter his house. He had made the same effort every night for weeks. Every time he failed.
He had never been one of those fools who did not realize what he had until it was gone. Sean had known full well that Stacy was his heart and soul. She was it for him, had been from the first moment he met her. Nothing had mattered more than Stacy. Absolutely nothing.
The void left by her death, something he thought could get no worse continued to grow. His life had been taken over by the snowball effect of loss. Loss of love followed by loss of control which led to more lives being lost. Most recently, he had lost his job, the last thing that identified him as the man that had been Stacy’s husband. The snowball gained momentum daily, leaving him to wonder what else there was left to lose.
He was powerless to do anything about it, watching his self destruction unfold like a bad movie. It lacked a fundamental realness. Nothing mattered anymore, everything seemed like an illusion and encouraged no emotion. He felt as if with the next blink he would open his eyes and it would be over. Every night he went to sleep with the same jitters a good thriller inspired but with the detachment of knowing it was all in his head. He knew once he fell asleep it would be over, he’d wake up and everything would be back to normal. Morning after morning he proved him wrong but he clung to this strange detachment.
Six weeks and it still seemed unreal.
Their once happy house had become a coffin. A ghost house, haunted by memories. Night after night, he couldn’t bring himself to enter it. One cheap apartment later, and he didn’t have to.
The closest he’d come was the porch, still littered with broken glass and stained with the blood of one of their attackers. Police tape hung in limp tatters from the doorframe. Bad B movie set design that invoked nothing but a sense of how fake it all seemed. But he still couldn’t go in.
Stacy had loved the beach house. It had belonged to her grandparents, willed to her when they passed on. Now it was his by the right of survivorship. It had been full of life and love. It died when she did. Dead, empty house.
He could retire on proceeds from selling it if he could bring himself to do it. Beachfront real estate in southern California was about as expensive as it could get. Bought in the 1940’s for $25,000 it was worth almost 40 times that now. Living the way he did, he could stretch that kind of money into his 90’s without ever lifting another finger. But he wouldn’t sell it. He couldn’t. He might let it rot in the ocean air, but he would never part with it.
Stacy had wanted to follow in her grandparent’s footsteps and leave the house, free and clear, to their children. The Alverez Family Trust to be renamed the Vetter Family Trust, as soon as there was a family.
They had had a plan. A few more years in the field, then a cushy desk job, safe and sound. Wait and raise a family then. Give her a few years to build her practice. They would do the kid thing right. It had been his idea.
Empty damn house.
In hindsight it was the dumbest idea he’d ever had. He didn’t want to be a single father, but at least he would have had a piece of her. Some part of his glorious woman would have lived on, grown up and shared her sparkle with the world. But no. He’d had to have one solitary moment of responsible practicality.
He wasn’t being practical or responsible now. Everything he and his wife had shared was still in the house with its broken windows and unlocked doors. A practical man would board the place up, move everything into storage. Not him. He wished the place would be looted. At least someone else would have cleaned it out. He wouldn’t have to face collecting up their life together, relegating it to attic boxes and goodwill. Then he could hate someone else for disturbing the memories, for making all that remained of Stacy disappear.
He viewed it as another tragedy that the one time he welcomed criminal behavior was the one time it utterly failed him. What could be more attractive than an empty beach house?
~End~
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