Today at breakfast Dr. Arkwright told me

Today at breakfast Dr. Arkwright told me he'd been thinking a lot about his last morning at home.

"That morning I woke at five with a perfect schematic drawing of a perpetual motion machine meticulously drawn in my imagination. I lay on my side in bed, running my mind's eye over each of the perfectly working parts, many nanoparticles I'd worked with in the lab.
"It occurred to me that there was a single problem, and, out loud I said, 'That gasket would have to be replaced every thirty years or so.'
"Muriel shifted and pressed herself tighter against me. I put my arm around her waist for balance, my hand on her breast for comfort.
"When next I woke, I was face down. The schematic drawing had evaporated and I was breathing against a damp spot on the pillow where my own drool had soaked the case. The covers were thrown back so there was a draft on my right side, the space next to me in the bed was empty, and there was only an accusatory depression in the mattress pad where my wife had been."