The Emerald Green Dress.

She bought that dress to please me.

It’s my favourite colour, and I love to see her wearing beautiful clothes. To complete the effect, she designed and made the necklace and earrings.

I work too much, travel too much and spend too much time away from her.

She’s patient, but for how long?

Fortunately, my job requires me to attend a lot of social occasions, particularly fund-raisers. We get to dress up and spend some time together. I’m not exaggerating when I say that I have the most beautiful wife. She has style and grace and something that is never applied to a male; poise.

She feels the cold, that’s why I’m putting my coat around her shoulders.

The first time I did that we were in Paris. 

We weren’t rich then, just a couple of kids who had worked hard for a few years; lousy part-time jobs while we studied. 

We lived on tinned soup and anything we could scrounge from the cafes we worked at. 

We were happy. 

Hungry, but happy.

Paris was our dream. 

I dreamed of being a writer and had visions of sitting in cafes that Hemingway sat in and writing a novel that the publishing world would fight over.

Her dream was different. 

She wanted to be a model. 

She wanted to be the model that famous painters fought over. 

Her dream became a reality, but mine didn’t quite make it. 

The war intervened and when it was over a bloke I fought alongside, who had saved my life on more than one occasion, introduced me to equities trading. 

I became rather good at it. 

Money always wins.

My novel sits in the bottom drawer of my desk at home.

She walked away from her modelling career to come back here and be my partner.

Sometimes I think I detect a kind of sadness in her eyes. Nothing too obvious, just a slight yearning.

There are paintings in important collections that feature her scantily clad beauty. Prominent artists still seek her out.

I drape the coat around her shoulders, and instantly, we are back on the West Bank in Paris. Young, poor and with our lives still in front of us.

I like making money, and I’m magnificent at it, but I don’t want to lose the lady in the emerald-green dress.

I wonder how long I can keep this up before someone steals her away? 

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