Pleasant euphoria.

Pleasant, yet overwhelming euphoria.

That was what Lauren felt at the start. When things were fresh. When things were new. And even now she thinks back and she still feels it. Because the feeling that love like that creates does not fade from the memory, even if the actual feeling itself decreases over time. And even if she’s been with him thirty years to the day, she can still feel it.

At the start, it was so new. So many smiles. The kind of big smiles that spread right across your face and make it ache. And you wish you could stop smiling, because your face aches so much, but you just can’t and it just aches more and more and more. The start is good like that.

At the start, there were never any tears. Not to begin with. They come in later, sure. But it’s like a package deal. And Lauren didn’t mind the tears, because even though at the time they hurt so much for her, when he stopped her crying and they were better again, she felt better than ever, and that euphoria was back. Because that was what happens just after the start.

He was twenty-one and she was twenty when they wed. Lauren’s parents always told her that she was too young to be getting married. But she didn’t care what they said. They were happy together, ready to take life in their stride and ride along the beautiful crest of its wave until their very end together. Because that’s the way the start makes you feel.

Sometimes Lauren likes to look at her wedding dress. It hangs up in her closet, on the inside of the door. And even today, twenty-seven years to the day after they wed, it’s as beautiful as ever. Maybe it still fits her, but she doesn’t know; it’s less special if you wear it more than once. You can only wear a wedding dress once. At the start.

There’s a rip in it.

Lauren never mended it. But it’s okay. Because even though when she looks at it and it feels like a great big rip in her heart, he doesn’t remember, because he was drunk when he ripped it. And if he doesn’t know, he can’t feel bad about it. And that’s what matters. Because she loves him, like she has since the start.

The fights were smaller back then. They always are, at the start. If they start out big, you never make it this far. Silly things. Petty things. But then, even the bigger arguments were the same. Just blown out of proportion. And they blow out of proportion more as time goes on.

At the start, they had wanted a baby one day. A nice, happy family. That was what the two envisioned for themselves. And it was a beautiful picture. The two of them, smiling happily on a Polaroid in their minds, behind a happily grinning baby. When they had the baby, it wasn’t like that. Maybe they both thought that it would save them.

It didn’t matter that they were wrong. Because they wanted a baby at the start.

At the start, they were so carefree. It was wonderful. Nothing could harm them. Everything just bounced off as they rode the wave. Because that was how it was at the start.

It didn’t stay like that.

Twenty years to the day ago, he lost his job. He wasn’t so carefree then. No money. A four-year-old to care for. And the drink. It was nice to have in moderation, at the start.

This wasn’t moderation.

But Lauren helped him through it. Because she loved him. Just like she did since the start.

Lauren stares at her ripped wedding dress and rubs a blackened mark on her arm. The bruises weren’t there since the start, like the love was. They came later. If they came at the start, you didn’t make it this far. But they were a package deal. If she told herself that, she could get through it.