A young MAN sits at a small, wooden table with worn corners and scuffed legs in an equally tiny but well-loved kitchen. The cabinets in the kitchen are painted sunshine yellow and the walls a bright shade of blue, but the rain outside the small window over the porcelain sink casts a look of gloom over the colorfully painted room. The kitchen is relatively neat except for some chipped plates in the sink, a pile of mail on the counter, and some lilies in a glass vase in the dim light of the window.

The man is wearing a pair of jeans and a black, wrinkled, dress shirt; his face a few days unshaven and his hair a mess. He is hunched over a coffee mug and a piece of lined paper on the table, several other pieces crumpled up on the table and tossed to the garbage can in the corner of the kitchen. His lips are set in a tight frown and his eyebrows are pulled together in distress as he holds a pen, trying to write something. After a moment or two of running his hands through his hair dejectedly, he slowly stands up, the movement looking almost painful, and lazily walks over to the mail on the counter. He wearily flips through the pile; all are colorful envelopes addressed to him, obviously all personal, judging from their greeting-card size, and he easily flicks them aside with a grimace on his face. One of the envelopes catches his eye, though, a plain white business envelope that was still to be sent, the stamp pressed crookedly to the corner. He does a double take when he sees it, his eyes raking slowly over the feminine cursive written there. A flicker of something registers in his tired-looking eyes, but it soon fades as he turns away from the envelope, absently fiddling with a gold ring on his finger.
He shuffles over to the refrigerator, pulling out some bread, and then to one of the sunshine yellow cabinets, looking at it wistfully.

On a different day, a different time, the man is seen dressed in a loose grey t-shirt and ripped jeans with a WOMAN, dressed in an oversized flannel shirt and boxer shorts, sitting on the counter as the man stands next to her. The kitchen looks newer, the floor covered in newspaper, the walls a brighter blue, and only half of the cabinets painted the yellow color. Both the man and the woman hold large paint brushes, the two of them covered in yellow paint as they continue to paint the cabinets. Sunlight streams in through the window over the sink, bathing the kitchen in a warm light. The woman laughs at something the man said, dabbing her fingertip in yellow paint and wiping it over the tip of his nose. The man looks momentarily surprised, but smiles brightly and retaliates by swiping some of the paint over the woman’s cheeks with his thumb. She laughs and grabs the man by his shirt to pull him in for a kiss.

The man blinks a few times at the memory, shaking his head the slightest bit with a small frown as he opens the cabinet and pulls out a jar of peanut butter. He grabs a butter knife from a drawer and sets about making himself a peanut butter sandwich, spreading the creamy substance evenly over one piece of the bread. He places the other piece carefully over top of the first, taking a bite of the sandwich.

This time the kitchen is dark, the clock above the oven reading 2:11 AM as the woman, guided gently by the man, measures out peanut butter to be mixed into a cookie batter, the two dressed in their pajamas. There are white Christmas lights strung up around the kitchen, casting a warm glow over everything in it, and from the next room comes the light from a small tree decorated with few ornaments. The man patiently teaches the woman how to make the cookies from scratch, tasting the batter with her and then feeding her a small spoonful of peanut butter.

The man looks distastefully down at the sandwich, wincing a little as he chews, and then moves to toss the sandwich into the trash, which is nearly overflowing with crumpled pieces of paper. He reaches into his back pocket as he moves back over to the table, sitting down as he pulls out his wallet and removes a small photo of the woman and him. He wistfully fingers the photo with one hand, his eyes welling up a bit, as his other hand holds the coffee mug on the table. A tear slips down his cheek as a scowl curls at his lips, letting out a pained sob as he hurls the coffee mug at the blue wall so that it shatters. The man buries his face in his free hand, wiping his eyes while he holds the picture carefully still, his shoulders heaving. After a few minutes, the man stands up and sets the picture on the table on top of his piece of paper, going to retrieve the shards of the mug on the ground and clean the coffee that is now all over the wall. He kneels down next to the glass, gingerly picking up the shards of the ceramic mug. The man looks at the loopy cursive on one of the shards and freezes, tears stinging at his eyes.

The woman and the man sit at the kitchen table while it rains outside, a cardboard box on the ground labeled “DECORATE YOUR OWN MUG!”, looking fairly dusty and old. The man’s mug is colorful and messy, the colors blended together and overall looking mediocre at best. He doesn’t pay attention to his own work, instead focused on watching the woman with a look of complete admiration, who is crouched over her own white mug, her tongue sticking out between her lips as she diligently focuses. After a moment, she shows him the finished mug, the name “Lily” written in beautiful black cursive. She smiles brightly at him, blushing a bit as she shows him her work, which she is obviously proud of. The man smiles softly at her, standing up and walking over to press a soft kiss to her lips.

The man purses his lips as he holds the shards of the mug in his hands, his eyes looking incredibly sad and glassy. He stands up, holding the shards, and sniffles a bit as he sets them all on the counter. He wipes his eyes, ignoring the mess of coffee all over the wall as he walks back over to his seat at the table, picking up the pen with a new kind of determination, and begins to write.

Several hours later, the man stands, clean shaven and shirt pressed in the rain, holding the paper and reading to a crowd of black umbrellas, headstones, and a casket.