Vocabularily Adventurous

Each white button slipped out of its respective embroidered slit without much resistance, and after withdrawing her arms from the long sleeves, she let the blouse fall unceremoniously into a pool on the tiled floor. She stepped out of her khaki trousers and silently removed the matching lace undergarments, followed by her nude knee-high stockings. Gazing at herself in the medicine cabinet's mirror, she unclasped the barrette at the back of her head, her hair tumbling over her shoulders and shimmering like freedom.

The water began steaming mere seconds after she turned the knob in the wall. She ran both hands under the hot stream that gushed out of the faucet before tugging on the lever that redirected the water through the shower head. After a short delay, it sputtered out, driving onto the porcelain tub's floor like insistent rain. She stepped under it's wet heat and slid the glass door so that not even the mirror could see.

She ran her hands over her scalp and slid her fingers through the thick waterfall of deep brown hair that cascaded down her back. The soapy loofah skimmed her body in earnest, removing any traces of the world of a few minutes ago. She turned off the water and stepped out of the shower a new woman.

One thick towel mopped up the beads of water that clung to her skin, and another held her sopping hair captive in a tower atop her head. She stared for another moment at her reflection, wrapped the towel around her torso, and opened the bathroom door.

Her husband lay a foot from the doorway, his head and shoulders propped up against the wall, the rest of his limp form sprawled on the carpet. His boxers were hiked up a bit from his graceless slide to the floor, and his hands lay open at his sides. His eyes were weighed down with long, dark lashes like a porcelain doll's, and his mouth was just open enough to show straight white teeth stained with blood. If not for several knife holes in his chest, he would have looked to be asleep.

She regarded him for a moment, smiling at how peaceful he looked. She had to step over his legs to get to her room, and the door swung shut behind her.