I couldn’t quite make out what she was complaining about.
She complained all the time so each of the vocal daggers she aimed at me just
melted down into a swirling pit of general disapproval. The ignorance of youth
and the parent-told picket fences of what was to be my future had splintered
and were now nothing more than annoyances and pending infections. I have given
up on pretending to care. A nod and a grunt seemed enough to shut her up so
that was how we communicated for the last few years. The bitch squealed and
squawked in her banshee fashion and I grunted in her general direction to let
her know that I was listening while muttering to myself about how little I cared
to try to help with her latest saga. I reckoned her moods were a result of
menopause and too many decades of reality tv shows and soap operas. I hope she
never looks in the corner of the wardrobe…I’ll never hear the end of it. I
cannot be blamed for seeking alternative entertainment. She hasn’t aged well
and the aftermath of having 3 kids hung on her hips as if to taunt me. She was
never my ideal woman but a few beers, a backseat and a positive pregnancy test
sealed my fate tighter that the doors on a submarine. This was my existence. My
prison.
I hauled my arse up off the couch and made my daily donation
of dishes into the sink. If I was going to have to pay for a maid she may as
well earn her keep. She was easy on the eyes which made the fact that she was
utterly useless at house-keeping, a little easier to bear.
My family life was headed down faster than the beers I chugged
down with Greg at the local watering hole. Misery loves company and I was
fucking miserable.
I waved blankly at the kids that morning and gave my banshee
a peck on the cheek to avoid her false concern about ‘how distant ‘I had become
and how I needed to try harder for the sake of the children. Bullshit. The kids
haven’t lifted their eyes from some screen of some sort since they were old
enough to type ‘LOL’…I wasn’t going to hurt anyone’s feelings.
Rancid bitch.
I climbed into my suffocating corporate attire and headed
toward the garage. There she was. My baby. The only thing I had to show for 30
long years of hard work, nappy-changing and keeping up with the Joneses. I put
on some Black Sabbath and relaxed for a while, feeling the velvet-soft caress
of the upholstery against the back of my neck. I opened the window just a bit.
Just enough for the hose…
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