(This is a true story will only the names changed to protect the innocent.)
"Bruno" married his high school girlfriend "Donna" when they were both 18. There were never any fireworks, or deep passion between them, but they got along well, and were congenial and had a pleasant marriage for 15 years.
Bruno, as his name implies, was seen as a big gruff man who liked Nascar, hunting, and coaching football. But Bruno harbored a tender poetic side he kept firmly hidden away from everyone. When he was in a deer stand, instead of waiting for a deer to come by, he would be writing love poems, or poems about nature and lonliness. He kept his little notebook in a zippered pants pocket. He was teased that he never shot a deer and his friends accused him of sleeping.

One bitterly cold day he came out of the woods in his old pickup onto a two laned blacktop. Up ahead he saw a car with a tire going flat pull off to the side of the road. He stopped and a woman got out of the car. He offered to help, and got the spare and the jack out of the trunk. She was so grateful, this woman. She stood next to him talking. She smelled clean and fresh, like soap and fresh air and sunshine. He was aware she was wearing a pink blouse and had long wavy dark hair. She was telling him who she was and he realized he'd gone to school with her brother. He didn't really look into her eyes until he had the tire changed.

He stood up and saw this woman had remarkable blue green eyes, and he was staring at her. The wind was blowing dark curls against her face--he wanted to ever so gently touch those curls and brush the hair of her face and kiss her right then and there.
She was, other than the eyes, a woman people might not notice, plain even. She said "How did you get all those scratches on your hands?" She held his fingers in her hands and it was like a lightning bolt. His voice was shaking .He said he'd been raking leaves and cleaning away some briars. She said I've got just the thing, and took some lotion from her car and gave to him. "Put this on and wear gloves and your hands will heal right up." No one had ever worried about his hands healing up. She thanked him again and leaned over and gave him a quick peck on the cheek. He was forever and irrevocably in love with this stranger. (Is there such a thing as love at first sight?)

Even in small towns, months may go by and people's paths may not cross. One day he saw her going into a store and hurried up and held the door for her. Their eyes met, then she hurried in. He wanted to say something to her and didn't know how. He wanted to tell her he dreamed of her and wrote poems to her. You silly ass, he thought, she'll think you're loco. He hid his passion for her. So months would pass and he'd see her here and there, never for long.

20 years passed and Bruno had a series of heart attacks and almost died. He thought of the stranger on his death bed. He recovered and one day saw the stranger in town. She looked wan and sickly. He went up to her and embraced her and didn't care if people saw him or what anyone would think. She said she was dying. He started to cry and told her he had loved her for so long. She leaned onto his chest and asked "Why did you wait so long?"
She died at home, with Bruno sitting by her bedside holding her hands. He took care of her for weeks as her life ebbed, he never left her side, his passion for her stronger than ever. He read her all the dog eared poems in his little notebook he had written for her. He was as tender and gentle with her as if she were a baby. His wife and family were puzzled and hurt and angry about his actions. They put it down to some sort of mental break.

A few months after she died, Bruno had the big one, a final heart attack, and all the people who had thought they had known him were left to ponder his actions and wonder who he really was.
Well, that's the story, told to me by his mother, the only person he ever confided in, and it happened in a teeny little town, a romance of sorts as grand as Dr.Zhivago; or so I like to think.

susil