perfect skin

Perfect Skin

When it came to bags, Mark spoiled Elisabeth rotten. And when her hunger for new purses could no longer be satiated, she fell into a depression. That night Mark offered to create the most luxurious hand-bag for her. This proposal was enough to lift her from her funk for as long as it took him to achieve such a task. 

The next day he took off on his quest. He flew to Fez in search of the best and oldest tanners. He then flew to Bangkok to hire the finest of Thai seamstresses. In a small Himalayan village,  he hired the most proficient fabric dyer. With promises of great rewards and glory, his dream-team was assembled and ready. He had one last mission: to find the perfect hide. He traveled with his team to the most remote and unchartered jungles of Africa in search of the perfect skin. The hunt went on for weeks but all in vain. The dream-team was losing faith in ever seeing their homes again, let alone rewards and glory. Until one day, a spark of genius.

Elisabeth lost all contact with Mark during the sixth week of his mission. Her euphoria was now down-sized to a mere curiousity regarding her husband’s whereabouts and doings. She wasn’t too worried.

That night the doorbell rang. She answered the door and it was the courier boy. He had a box. On it was her name and address. She thought it was odd that her name was spelled wrong. Mark knew that she absolutely hated it when people spelled her name with a z instead of an s. And this was not Mark’s handwriting at all! It looked like it had been scribbled by a child. She looked at the postage stamp:  Congo. She opened the box. Her heart started racing. A sliver of smooth, walnut brown leather peeped through the pink tissue paper wrapping. She tore the paper off and unfurled the neatly folded object inside. It was the most luxurious bag she had ever seen; the softest, most pliant leather and the most exquisite detailing. It even had a little pouch inside for her phone. She pressed her face against it and inhaled the fragrance into her lungs. The smell was painfully familiar. She didn’t know why but it felt like home. And then she remembered Mark.