A penny for your thoughts,
A Penny for Your Thoughts
As the sun slowly rose above the horizon, bathing the village of Polemos in the warm glow of an orange morning sky, Emma opened her eyes and yawned. She turned toward the place where her husband, Lamine, should have been lying asleep.
He wasn’t there.
Her eyes opened fully as she looked at the clock.
“What’s he doing up at seven on a Sunday morning?” she wondered quietly.
She rubbed her eyes once more, pushed the sheets aside, climbed out of bed, and stretched with another long yawn.
After stopping briefly at the bathroom to splash some cold water on her face, she made her way downstairs. She headed for the kitchen, expecting to find him making breakfast—or perhaps enjoying a quiet cup of coffee.
Instead, she found Lamine sitting silently at the kitchen table. A steaming mug of coffee stood beside a notebook that lay open before him.
She frowned slightly as she walked over, gently resting a hand on his shoulder.
“Good morning, dear,” she said softly, kissing the back of his head. “What are you doing here this early on a Sunday morning?”
As she glanced down at the notebook, she noticed it wasn’t filled with ordinary diary entries. There were two names she didn’t recognize, the name of a place that couldn’t possibly exist, and several lines that looked like the outline of a story.
Tilting her head with quiet curiosity, she smiled.
“What is all this you’re writing, baby?”
For a brief moment she wondered if she had misunderstood what he had said.
Lamine looked up, smiled, and gently rested his hand on hers.
“Just writing down something that came to me during the night.”
She looked back at the notebook.
“This isn’t just a few notes,” she said. “It looks like the beginning of something.”
He looked at the page for a moment before answering.
“I think… I might be starting a story.”
He almost surprised himself by saying the words out loud. Until that moment, they hadn’t quite felt real.
“You’re writing a story?” she asked, raising an eyebrow. “Since when do you write?”
He gave a small shrug.
“I honestly don’t know. It just came to me in a dream last night. It’s nothing big yet. I don’t even know if it’ll turn into anything.”
Emma smiled warmly.
“Whatever it becomes,” she said, leaning down to kiss him on the cheek, “I hope it makes you happy.”
She paused before adding with a playful smile,
“And promise me one thing… don’t let me become an outsider.”
Lamine smiled back.
“I promise,” he said. “You’ll be the very first person to read it… or, if you prefer, the first to hear it.”
He winked before kissing her cheek in return.
Together they looked out through the kitchen window.
Outside, the sun had fully risen, bathing Polemos in the golden light of a brand-new day.
Perhaps, Emma thought, it wasn’t just the beginning of another Sunday.
Perhaps it was the beginning of a whole new chapter in both of their lives.