The Unexpectedly Short Romance

   The man's wife, a young woman, died because she had fallen in love with a man who had the A.I.D.S. virus and three years after marrying him she had very quickly succumbed to his disease which she'd chosen, quite willingly, to catch from him, since she knew she could never live without him.

It had taken her some convincing of him.

He was much older than she.

He had never consented to the idea.

However, she died before he did, which surprised him during the few milliseconds that his grief subsided.

She was only twenty three years old.

She had been known to appear in the types of magazines sold and/or read for free

at the places where people lined up and waited in line

at the checkouts in 'super' markets all around the world.

She was a movie star and famous in such a manner that thirty year old girls with and without two or three kids, all around the world, spoke with a sigh of sadness

upon hearing the news of her unexpected passing.

The news media, (under the influence

of the entertainment industry managers),

had broadcast a story they'd made up

stating that the house they'd lived in

was somehow to blame

for the sudden and premature death.

Knowing full well that one day

because of this deliberate omission

the truth

regarding the matter

would come out

into the public consciousness.

Many years, perhaps even many decades later.

Just two years later her husband, he died, too.

He'd been a successful script writer when he'd met her

and they'd married, despite his disbelief.

He'd died in the mysteriously similar circumstances that she, his wife, had,

and this in the very same house in which she, his wife, had also died.

He was forty three.

They said it was the house, again.

After all, what kind of house can kill two people?

The clue they'd left

was that there was never any explanation given,

of the theory

as promised by the scientific

'experts',

in regard to this

little known phenomenon,

quickly declared by the knowledgeable

yet, unnamed experts as,

'Sick House Syndrome'.

The logical explanation of this 'sickness'

and the failure of it to ever materialise

in a readily accessibly,

easily digestible,

fully publicly comprehensible manner

proved, therefore,

obviously,

that it did not

really exist.

This was something that was a lot easier to explain

than something which made a whole lot of sense.