The Wake Up. by Kelli J Gavin

He smells the coffee she has made for him
Every morning as long as he can remember
Coffee brewed strong and black
Never with cream or sugar
Just the way he likes it
Bold and shocking
No coffee to smell this morning
Only the memory of a scent once anticipated
He rolls onto his side to see if his bride
May still be sleeping next to him
Her small portion of bedding not slept in
She was never there in the night
How did he not know this
Didn’t he feel her stir beside him
Muscle memory takes over
When he thinks she was
Always there next to him
Memory has failed him
When he remembers she hasn’t
Been beside him for quite some time
Coffee hasn’t been made in 4 months
Every morning since
He continues to wake up
Believing he smells the coffee she brewed for him.

Kelli J Gavin lives in Carver, Minnesota with Josh, her husband of an obscene amount of years and they have two crazy kids. She is a Writer, Professional Organizer and owns Home & Life Organization and a small Jewelry Company.  Look for Kelli’s first book of short stories and poems in 2019. You can find her work with The Ugly Writers, Sweatpants & Coffee, Writing In a Woman’s Voice, The Writers Newsletter,  Writers Unite!, Academy of the Heart and Mind, The Rye Whiskey Review, Spillwords, Mercurial Stories, 121 Words, HerStry, Ariel Chart, The Basil O’Flaherty, PPP Ezine, Southwest Media, Otherwise Engaged, Pleather Skin, Paper.Li, The New Ink Review, among others.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                   Find Kelli on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram @KelliJGavin Blog found at kellijgavin.blogspot.com