Red shoes

Here's one I wrote at Andy and Steve's Creative Writing class just before Xmas:

"Whatever happened to those red shoes you used to wear?"
"Red shoes?"
"Yes."
"I never ever have had red shoes."
"Oh."
"Must have been one of your other girl friends."
"Oh."

Silence.

There was no going back or rather no going forward. Think laterally, talk about Christmas.... anything.

She looked at me with such a sad look on her face. Anger I could have dealt with. I could have even enjoyed a good row, but that sad look hit me in the guts - a physical sensation, almost painful.

It's like I am digging an ever deeper hole but I am not doing anything active so it is more like quicksand - in which we are both sinking. I must do something, anything to change this, to break the mood.

"Coffee?"
She nods almost inperceptibly.

'Oh fuck' I think to myself as I leave the room. I put the kettle on and lean against the radiator.

How do you re-weave a broken web? OK so that which does not destroy me (us?) makes me (us?) stronger but what if I (we?) am not destroyed merely wounded? I don't feel stronger neither does she. What a tangled web that now fragments who were, are and can be. 'Sorry?' 'Sorry doesn't do it.'