I liked this story, but once I realized where it was going, I got thrown off by the timeline. Our protagonist has aged visibly, buildings and construction in the neighborhood have collapsed, and her husband's corpse has completely disintegrated. But she still seems to have running water, as well as enough food, shower gel and athletic gear to continue the daily cycle. Even if amnesia and denial interlock perfectly, she would have to have run into some logistical problems by now, right?
A lot of good points, clashing colors. The way I imagined it working was like this...
Maybe one day she gets up and the milk is all gone. So on that particular day, she drives to the nearby grocery store. She's confused by the parking lot, how everyone has just parked willy nilly, ignoring the yellow lines. She rushes through the mess, grabs a milk and maybe some canned stuff, mimicking the other frantic shoppers. She knows something bad is happening and returns home to flip on the news. What she sees is terrible, devastating. But, after a rough night tossing and turning, her REM cycle resets her brain and she wakes up the next morning without any memory of the insanity at the grocery the day before.
So, she goes about her business; going for a run, making coffee with milk, and grinding her teeth at the fact that her husband never comes home. Out with his disgusting mistress again, she thinks.
A few days later she's out of milk again but this time the supermarket is abandoned. Aisles are cluttered with dumped boxes and rotting fruit. Shattered glass crunches underfoot as she makes her way to the back of the store, using her cell phone to light the way. She hasn't had service in days but she knows what's going on in the world and now she has proof of just how bad it is. She returns home with some powdered milk and spends all day trying to call her parents on the phone but only gets a busy signal. She decides to drive up to their house the next day to see if everything is ok. But, after a night's sleep, she ties on her shoes and goes for a run...
I know, it's not the perfect scenario that she never gets out of her house, that she never just hops in her car to drive right away to her parents' house. But, life is made up of all sorts of decisions and maybe hers are always weak ones, stupid ones. Maybe she's the kind of person that always puts stuff off until tomorrow. Even when the water eventually stops and the electricity cuts off...
Thanks for reading.