Daniel threw the mail on table by the door as he came in. “I’m home babe,” he called out as he took off his shoes.

“Hey good looking,” Alice said, coming over to kiss him. She picked up the mail. “Anything good?”

“Junk. How was your day?”

Alice did not answer. She was engrossed in a postcard-size, glossy mailout advertising a beauty seminar. Daniel had glanced at it while rifling through the mail downstairs, but hadn’t noticed anything that would warrant that kind of scrutiny. He went to the kitchen and got a beer from the fridge, cracking it open.

“So how was it babe?” he said, taking a long pull.

“How was what?” Alice said, in a distracted voice, still reading over the mailout.

“Your day.”

“Oh, it was fine,” Alice said, setting down the mail and looking up at him to smile. “How was yours?”

Daniel shrugged and took another drink of beer. “Same old. What are you thinking for supper?”

After dinner, when Daniel went to put the mail in the recycling, he noticed the mailout was missing.

“You thinking of attending that seminar?” he said, when he came back into the apartment.

“What seminar?”

“The one from the mail. The one you were looking at.”

“Oh no,” Alice said, laughing. “I thought I recognized the name of the company. I think maybe a friend of mine works there. I was going to look it up.”

Daniel grunted in response and went to turn on the television. Alice watched him for a moment, biting her lip. When Daniel glanced up from the television she smiled and he smiled in turn.

Read the rest at Circumambient Scenery.

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