***
It was Sunday evening when he finally returned home. As he’d expected, Nancy was upset with him. He had told her three days, but he was gone for six. Even though she was not the violent type, she was still vindictive, and she took out her frustration on his dinner. When she served him his plate, all he could do was stare at it, and then at her.
“What’s this?” he asked.
“Dinner.”
He looked at his plate again.
“Where is it?”
“You’re looking at it.”
He looked again. She had given him three peas for dinner. That was it.
“No steak?” he asked.
She had put a nice thick steak on her own plate, along with some broccoli and potatoes. She also had a cold glass of white wine beside her. Norman didn’t have anything to drink beside his plate.
“Steak is for husbands who keep their promises,” she said.
“So you only cooked one?”
“One’s all I can eat.”
Norman rolled his eyes. Then he ate his three peas.
They sat in silence for several minutes. Randall, who had already gone to bed, was out of the field of tension. Anything Norman said to Nancy, he could say with honesty, and vice versa. But, he didn’t really have anything to say. She had made a request, he had accepted it, and then he had blown it. He deserved his peas.
“Did you at least solve your little mystery?” she finally asked, as she polished off what remained of her steak.
Norman shook his head.
“I see.”
Norman wanted to look back down at his plate to avoid eye contact, but he didn’t have anything worth his attention. He had already finished his dinner.
“Well, at least you’re home now,” she said. “You can take out the trash tonight. And then you can sleep with it.”
Cards in the Cloak Page 10