The red ribbon

Hello friends and welcome to another blog post (hopefully you get my reference). Today I wanted to share with you a story that has been told many times, but I really like it and I felt like writing it again as a blog post. So... here ya go.

The red ribbon

       Once upon a time, a young man met a beautiful young woman, and after a time of seeing each other, they fell deeply in love. Within a year they had wed. One thing the man had always found interesting about his wife was that she always wore a thin red ribbon almost as jewelry around her neck. And she never took it off. Not when she changed, slept, swam, nor bathed did she once take the ribbon off. Whenever he questioned her about it, she would always ignore him or change the subject. Whenever he tried to touch it or untie it, she would always exclaim, "Hey," or, "Don't touch my ribbon," and swat away his hand. Though he remained curious, eventually, he gave up on asking. Many years past and the couple had found that they had indeed grown old together. Though they had never had any children, they had a deep-rooted love for each other that had lasted a lifetime. Through all of this time, the woman had not once removed the red ribbon from around her neck. After some time the woman had caught a terrible illness. Her time had come. The man, now wrinkled, sat at the foot of the bed that belonged to the woman, now frail, as they both sat, now old, in the hospital. With eyes that still glowed like burning embers, the woman looked up at her husband's face, lives worth of love in her weary smile. "Darling, I love you deeper than the deepest oceans will ever go," she said, "And I know you have always pondered the red ribbon that I wear around my neck night and day." 

"Yes, I love you to the moon and back. But why does your ribbon matter after all of these years?" he questioned, eyes poring into hers.

"Well, you have been my love for so long I feel bad keeping such secrets from you. Just know I have always loved you from the moment we first met," and with that, she used all the strength she had left to sit up and kiss him on the cheek. His face knotted into a frown, but a questioning smile at the same time. She gave a faint, knowing smile in return. With that, she reached up to the ribbon that she always kept around her neck. With a small pinch, she pulled at one of the corners of the graceful bow that had sat there, with her head lying on the pillow. With a gentle tug, the ribbon unraveled. The bow unlooped and the ends fell apart, revealing a small cut that turned to a long, skinny open wound as the ribbon gave away. The woman's head fell back, then rolled off the bed, at the man's feet. It was followed by the red ribbon, that had kept it in place the entire time.