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It was simple. He just had to pretend and she'd made that easy. If he ignored her slightly darker hair and the fact she was a tad shorter he could pretend. Because her dress was the same colour and fabric that she always wore. Her hair fell to just about the same length so he could pretend. It would be fine, yes, just fine. To pretend.
Pretending was hard. One kiss had been easy but, she didn't like walking the dogs. She took several steps away when he was covered in god knows what and perhaps worst of all, she hated playing a word game with him. The first sign of his cheating she had rolled her eyes and said, "if you're going to cheat like that then you can play by yourself." He couldn't pretend.
He was a fool.
She was not.
He couldn't pretend on Sundays. He watched her with an affection in his eyes that had never been aimed at herself. It hurt. At the dinner table, he thanked her with such vigour and grandiose that his pretending on other days was obvious and then, oh dear lord, had come the baby, the granddaughter. It was like everything and everyone ceased to exist. The two of them, and this baby. Her baby's baby.
Dorothy could not compete. She'd let him pretend a little while longer, she hated pretending.
"Siegfried I don't like walking the dogs." She told him.
"I know that, you're not very good at pretending you do."
"Exactly but you have to do the pretending for both us," Dorothy said, Siegfried gulped as they continued down the forest path, "I'm not her."
"Not who?"
"Siegfried. Stop. Just stop. It's gone on long enough." He stopped and stared at her. She knew.
"I hereby give you full permission to stop pretending you like me. I'm not who you want, I am me own woman. I can't be her. Now take these bloody great dogs and get home. Tell her. Don't be polite or pretend it isn't something important. Tell her every detail in your heart." Dorothy poked at his chest.
"I am sorry I pretended for so long. It wasn't fair, I do want you to be happy it's just-"
"Not going to be with you. I worked that out a while ago, maybe I did a bit of pretending myself. Now go on, go. Tell Audrey Hall you love her, and look after her for me." She shooed him away. Dorothy but her bottom lip as he rounded up the dogs, their dogs, and ran back the way they'd come.
Nobody should live a life pretending.