I should have listened.

Instead, I blindly rang the doorbell and only after stared down in patient contemplation of the shoes. These were not serious, staid shoes. They could not belong to one constrained by normality and reason.

The simple, comfortable style hinted at a practical spirit, no slave of fashion and propriety. The bright colors screamed exuberance, that enviable joie-de-vivre some people seem to find without medication. The polka dots gave away that a sense of whimsy lay beneath the practicality.

My sigh of disappointment was half out already as the door opened to reveal a remarkably tanned young woman, though tanned in the natural way, not that sickly orange spray stuff. She smiled sweetly, and her eyes begged a question.

“Hello,” I began wearily as I had so many times, “I’m looking for someone, Elaine Traivors.”

“Ooh,” she said, her mouth in an exaggerated expression of sympathy, “You’re years late on that count. Why would you be looking for old Plain Elaine?”

“She was my wife.”