Chatting

Life is strange. Who could have known 
that we would someday get engaged? 
I am sure there is another 
timeline in which everything 
goes smoothly between us from then on. 
In that story that never happened,
I finish my engineering degree 
while she, my doe-eyed wife, expands 
her piano teaching studio. 
Upon my tardy graduation,
I find a stable job somewhere 
and climb the rungs of a corporate ladder. 
We save some money early on, 
then buy a house and settle down. 
Soon, we rush off a child or two 
to school every morning before our work. 
After building up our fortune, 
we retire a few years early 
to enjoy the final sunset decades 
of our lifelong love and romance. 
Every night, we go to bed 
content, unbothered by our choices — 
mine to propose, hers to accept. 
Though sometimes in the darkest hours, 
I wonder about what could have been.