Dena slept peacefully. Her long brown hair covered the soft down cushion, her lips breathing soflty. She was a quiet sleeper, never moving or turning, never making noises through her nose or throat. At the age of 32, she still possesed the beauty of youth but also the beginnings of age and wisdom.
Lying next to her in bed, the love of her life, the man she could always rely on and talk to, was Johns.
He had awoke, as he always did, with dawn. He was a man who didnt need much sleep. Five hours was enough for him, and at mornings he always felt his best. Before the hustles and movings of the streets and the noises of cars, to hear nature and see the sun before anyone else was a drug to him. He lay there, as ever, as every morning for the last decade or more, lovingly gazing upon his wife.
"How lucky am I?", he thought, "To wake every morning to see this face."
An accomplished author of childrens fiction, Johns had no reason to remove himself from this happiness immediately. He worked in his study at home, when he had to work at all. His parents had been wealthy, giving him support to follow his ambitions of writing, and his writings brought cheques often enough to live a life of ease.
Slipping at last out of the covers, naked as he always slept, the tall body of a man also in his early thirites wrapped a gown around himself and headed downstairs.
Not noticing the calendar on the wall of their bedroom, he picked up the cat, who upon until that point, was peacefully dreaming at the foot of the bed.
Heading down the stairs, cat in hand, the letter box clanged. The mailman doing his job.
Glancing over the letters that fell on to the brown spiked door mat, Johns recognized the brown letters of bills, always paid in advance and never ever a day late. He scooped them up and headed to the kitchen. Oscar purred at the sight of the cat flap he could see with his keen eyes at the back door and leapt out of Johns hands.
Johns wasnt much a coffee drinker, his parents where from an English background and had drunk tea. He ignored the coffee maker and headed for the kettle.
Looking through the window outside as he filled it with water, he watched Oscar leap over the fence into the outside world.
The sun was now shining over the garden, and the lilies and pansies and marigolds lovingly placed in the natural sanctuary they belonged came to life.
Johns place the kettle back down and pressed the button. Walking to the kitchen door he pushed it close, to minimise the sounds for his sleeping wife he had left upstairs.
"This door, we'll have to get it fixed." He said to himself as he walked back to the letters on the table, having to leave it ever so slightly ajar.
Seeing the letters on the table, he caught sight of a white letter. Strange in their professional lives, all correspondance was sent direct to publishers or the hospital, and they only recieved mail directed at the household. Bills or reminders, never a letter mailed to them personally.
A quick glance over the addressee, it was mailed to both himself and his wife. Written in a childs writing possibly, or that of an uneducated adult.
Leaving the letter he headed over to the kettle, busying himself with milk and sugar.
The sound of the cat flap caught his attention, a happy looking Oscar had returned, waiting for breakfast. The white letter once again caught his eyes.
At 5.30 am, he knew it was far too early to awake his wife. A surgeon needed sleep, he knew, and at least another two hours to be fair.
An imaginative man, by no means impulsive or reckless, curiosity overcame him. Johns opened the letter.
Glancing over the contents, he leapt from the chair at the kitchen table he had sat at. A red mist formed around him, as Oscar stared unknowingly.
