Lack of spices

 I love my wife. Not only because she’s the mother of my children, but also because she’s an amazing woman. But every morning, when she prepares breakfast, there’s a stranger at the kitchen door staring at her.

         “Ah, there you are. Your coffee’s ready, honey,” she says, turning around to greet me with that gentle, trusting smile. I smile back, scanning her cheeks, generously sprinkled with her trademark freckles that, after all these years, still enchant me.

I pick up my mug and sit at the table without taking my eyes off her. Slowly, I outline the contours of a body that, every morning, covers itself with a robe the color of a sea storm, and in the silence of the moment, I feel a tightness in my heart.

         “How’s the coffee?” she asks.

I take a sip and stop, unsatisfied with the taste.

         “It’s ah.. not spicy enough.”

         “Spicy?! Coffee’s not supposed to be spicy, honey!”