Artifact

Jim jogged the two short blocks to his apartment and headed straight for the bedroom. He flung open his closet and dug out one of the boxes stacked against the back wall - the ones he still hadn’t unpacked since returning from Stamford. He kept meaning to, but somehow he never got around to it.

He walked into his bathroom, dug his hand into the inner chest pocket of his jacket and wrapped it around Pam’s pot. He took it out and there, in the bright unforgiving light, studied it closely. He turned it over, felt the weight of it, how cool it was in the palm of his hand. Its delicate lip was slightly chipped, probably from colliding with a beer bottle when Karen tossed it away. He ran his thumb slowly over the small spot of naked pale pinkish clay exposed beneath the pot's fanciful surface.

It seemed so raw, so vulnerable, so unspeakably sad.

Without looking up at his own reflection in the mirror, he gently rinsed the pot in the sink, then reached for a towel – the same one he’d used earlier that day when he’d showered before heading over to Karen’s place. He dried the pot carefully, like it was precious, a relic perhaps. An artifact of a time and place that never really existed, but that he missed all the same.

Back in his bedroom, he rummaged through his dresser and found an old soft t-shirt. He tenderly wrapped the pot in it, taking care to protect it as best he could. He placed the bundle safely in the box and put the box back in the closet.

He closed the door.

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