Two steps behind. space for conversation?- just air. It expands between us. A void of unspoken words, almost conversations and dismissed aknowledgments. A force grows stronger forcing into my chest, concaving into my lungs causing short breaths, i struggle for air. The heart beats faster trying to get oxygen to my body, i feel my fingertips numbing, my toes sprinkle with chill. Heavy legs. just my heart beating in my ears, in my head. it seems this is the only place it now resides. My chest no longer houses the heart; the organ or the life. Instead i stand hollow. A model of a model wife. A shell of the girl i was. Fifty years of duty. We stand silent just like on our wedding day. White dress hanging loose over a flat torso. Just the heart trying to escape, thrashing against the ivory bars. We cave to submission as the gold band is thrust on my finger. His hands so rough from a life of work, mine still so small and soft, barley fourteen. We stand together his face now as rough as his hands were back then. Words have bound us but these are the only words that exist between us anymore. I watch as my own life is replayed right in front of me in the form of my daughter. My eye sockets look dark around the edges as i look out through them from inside this inextricable man-made casing. I stand a woman with no voice to be heard. I stand in his world. Always two steps behind.