Darren never heard the sound of the shot as it rang out from the cold pistol held in his wife’s trembling hands. He never heard the sound of the shell dropping swiftly to the tile floor. He never heard the sound of his own body thudding to the ground as swift and clanking as the bullet. All Darren heard were the three words from Ellen’s dry lips.

“You did this,” she said.

After a dead silent 4 seconds, Darren felt a wave of unnerving pain flash over his chest and then spread to his fingertips and feet like poison. Lead poison. Poison the spread so fast and lethal that it brought an immediate patch of maroon paint to Darren’s stomach.

Looking up now, Darren had seen that Ellen was gone, the pistol was gone, but the shell was still there. The shell, a perfect symbol of their relationship. It was a mere shell of what it was before.

Empty.

Hollow.

And this was where it had lead them. Till death did they part. This definitely qualified.