Commitment

by K. M. Golland

  ‘Whatever they are doing is on them, Tashy. It doesn’t concern you.’

  I stood up. ‘Stop calling me that.’

  He stood up, too, and placed his hands on my arms. ‘Hey! Calm down,’ he said softly, bending down to search my eyes. ‘What’s wrong?’

  ‘This. All of this. It’s wrong.’

  ‘It’s fine. It will sort itself out.’

  ‘It’s not fine,’ I argued, shrugging his arms from mine and taking a step backwards, tripping on the leg of the chair and losing my balance.

  Dale reached out and caught me in his arms, my body suspended as if he’d dipped me at the conclusion of a dance, kiss pending.

  The air grew thick with anticipation, my heart pounding, my eyes searching his. I didn’t know what to do or say. I wanted to kiss him, wanted him to kiss me, and yet I didn’t. I loved Dean with all of my heart and appreciated everything we’d shared and built together. I was married, happily, and I wanted it to stay that way.

  Having no choice but to lighten the situation before something happened that I’d regret, I laughed and buried my face into his chest. ‘Thank you. I’m sorry. I’m such a klutz.’

  Burying my face prevented lip on lip action. It also allowed me to soak in how amazing he smelled and how hard, warm and inviting his chest was. Sweet doughy donuts.

  He lifted me upright. ‘No worries. Anytime. You sure you’re okay?’

  ‘Yeah, yeah, I’m fine,’ I said dismissively, moving towards the door. ‘It’s all good. I just need to go, ya know?’ My eyes pleaded with him not continue the conversation. I just needed to leave and gather my thoughts, which were scattered all around me like a dust storm.

  I just needed to go home to Dean.

  CHAPTER

  8

  DEAN

  When I walked through the door after a horrid day at work, I was fucking spent. One of my clients — an ignorant dickwad — had been charging all kinds of bogus expenses against his company, expenses that triggered an audit from the tax office. Honestly, I understood the desire to claim as many tax reductions as possible, but fuck … do it within reason and without a massive red flag attached to your arse. It wasn’t that hard.

  Dropping my car keys on the kitchen bench, I headed straight to the porcelain god, almost doubling back to retrieve my keys because, apparently, I was ‘supposed’ to hang them on the hook near the front door.

  I never did, and it pissed Tash off.

  Not having time to reconsider, because turtle-necking, I quickly said ‘Hi’ and hurried to the sanctity of the shitter. I hated using the ones at work. There were always serial bombers and pesky lurkers. And just the other day, when I’d been attempting to farewell the beef rendang from the previous night, some arsehole decided they’d take five minutes to play Clash of Clans.

  Clash. Of. Fucking. Clans.

  There I was, clenching my arse cheeks to avoid an avalanche of troops — aka I’m never eating that hot-as-fuck curry again — and the gamer douche outside my cubicle was building and training troops of his own. Fuck me stupid. So yeah, I reserved the right to shit in my own toilet, in my own home, in peace and before husband and father duties commenced for the evening.

  After crackin’ off a couple of bricks, I headed out to face the key-on-the-hook music, which, strangely enough, never came. Instead, Tash was completely consumed by whatever she was stirring in the pot on the stove.

  ‘HI, DAD,’ Thomas yelled before bounding into my arms.

  Tash jumped and finally realised I was home. I smiled at her and she smiled back, albeit warily.

  ‘Hey, buddy, how you feeling?’

  Thomas shrugged. ‘Yeah, all right. My tummy is better now.’

  ‘That’s good.’

  He placed his hands on either side of my face and held my head firm. ‘If your tummy hurts, fart. It helps. But be careful. Sometimes it’s not a fart.’

  ‘No. That, my young Padawan, is a splart or shart. But good to know. Thanks for the advice.’ I chuckled and let him slide down my front until he was on his feet again.

  ‘Anytime,’ he said before running off to William’s room. William poked his head out and waved.

  I waved back.

  ‘How was work?’ Tash asked, readying to lift the pot of boiling water she’d been stirring.

  ‘Here. Let me.’ I directed her to put it back down so that I could drain it for her.

  ‘Thanks.’ Her voice was quiet, her lips soft as they pressed a quick kiss to my cheek. She walked to the bench and picked up my keys, and I was just about to tell her that I was going to move them when she made her way to the hook and hung them up herself. No arguments. No complaints. Weird.

  ‘I was going to do that,’ I admitted, pouring the water and potatoes into the big silver bowl with a fuckload of holes that she’d placed in the sink, steam rising up and burning my face.

  ‘You were going to do what?’

  I leaned back out of the billowing steam and mumbled, ‘Hang the keys.’

  ‘Oh.’ She shrugged and shook her head, as if she didn’t care.

  Again, weird. Tash would normally bite my head off, chew on it, and then spit it at my feet for leaving them where I had.

  ‘All right, what’s up? What have you done? What did you buy?’ I asked suspiciously.

  Her brows pinched. ‘Huh?’

  ‘A new handbag? Ruffleknickers?’

  ‘Nothing.’ She scowled. ‘I didn’t buy anything. And they’re rufflebutts, not knickers.’ She dismissed me yet again and opened the fridge, bending over to search for something.

  ‘You’re not pissed off about the keys?’

  Sighing, she closed the fridge door with her hip and carried milk and butter to the bench. ‘Maybe I’m over being pissed off about the keys, Dean. Maybe it’s just not worth it anymore.’

  I cracked up laughing as I poured the potatoes back into the pot. ‘Come on, what did you buy? Or did you break something … run over something?’

  ‘Ha ha,’ she mocked, gripping the edge of the bench and turning to face me. ‘Look, there’s a hook by the front door that is specifically for keys. If you hang them there, you’ll never lose them. It’s like magic. Win win. Keys off my freakin’ bench, keys where you will always find them.’ She indicated I pass the pot to her by looking at it and raising her eyebrows. ‘If you choose not to hang them there, that’s your loss. If I have to move them out of my way and don’t remember where I’ve moved them to, that’s your loss as well.’

  ‘Why wouldn’t you just move them to the hook, like you did a second ago?’ I asked, confused, sliding the pot in front of her.

  My suggestion was perfect logic.

  ‘Why wouldn’t you just fucking hang them there in the first place?’ she snapped, snatching up the pot. Okaaaay, maybe she hasn’t bought or broken anything.

  ‘Whoa!’ My hands went up in surrender. ‘Okay. Shit. I’ll hang them up next time.’

  ‘You say that every time and yet you never do it. You know what? Just forget about it.’

  For a second, I watched as she grabbed the potato masher and pounded the shit out of the potatoes. I wanted to ask her what else was wrong, maybe rescue a vital portion of our dinner before she pulverised it to slush, but there was no point in asking. When Tash got worked up, she simply blamed me for everything. And I wasn’t in the mood for being blamed for petty shit that happened two weeks ago, four months ago … ten years ago.

  So, I forgot about it, like she’d asked me to, and sat down on the sofa with the boys. They were watching Family Feud.

  It was ironic.

  * * *

  Tash was unusually quiet during the days that followed. She’d barely spoken after we’d fought, so I’d put it down to her being on her period and made sure I hung the keys on the hook — every day. At that point, I’d figured she’d talk to me again when she was ready. She always did. Plus, to be completely honest, every now and again it was nice to have a spouse-smoko — that sweet, short hiatus with an
absence of nagging.

  As nice as spouse-smoko was, we were now on day three of silent treatment, not to mention it was Thomas’s birthday. Her sulking needed to expire, ASAP. Three days was long enough.

  ‘Do you need any help with the food?’ I asked, standing behind her as she bent down and placed a tray of party pies and sausage rolls in the oven. Seeing her arse before me at the perfect height triggered an overwhelming urge to grab it, smack it and thrust myself against it. Hard. But I didn’t. I wanted my spouse-smoko to end, not extend.

  ‘Nope. I’m good. Just make sure no one pees in the pool.’ Her response was curt. It pissed me off.

  ‘How the fuck am I supposed to do that?’ I murmured to myself.

  She stood up and turned to face me, removing her oven mitts and slapping them down on the benchtop. ‘Easy. If they’ve swum off to be alone then they’re draining the tank. It’s the “golden” rule,’ she explained sarcastically, even twitching her fingers like quotation marks.

  That pissed me off even more

  ‘Okay, what the hell is wrong? Spit it out now before everyone arrives. This shit needs to end.’

  ‘Spit it out now?’ she whisper-hissed, glancing to see if the boys were in the room. ‘Spit what out now? The fact you haven’t spoken to me for three days? It’s a bit late for that.’

  I ran my hands through my hair and gritted my teeth. ‘I haven’t spoken to you? Are you crazy? You haven’t spoken to me.’

  ‘No, I’m not crazy.’ She turned her back on me again. ‘Don’t worry about it. Now is not the time.’

  I leaned back against the cupboards. ‘Don’t say that. You never mean it, because when I do what you say and “not worry about it”, I’m the bad guy.’

  ‘Dean, what do you want me to say?’

  ‘I want you to say what’s really going on here. What else would I want?’

  She scoffed. ‘Typical. That’s what all you men want, for us women to spell every fucking thing out for you. If we did that, none of you would have to think at all. How fucking easy would that be?’

  What.

  The.

  Fuck.

  Is.

  She.

  On?

  She had to be an evil clone … or on drugs. The Tash before me wasn’t my Tash. Even with her pissy mood, she was acting weird. Shit! Maybe she’s going through that disease women get when they go batshit crazy and can’t have kids anymore. What’s it called? Menhavepaws? Men-NO-Pause?

  I stared at her, not knowing what to do or say. I never knew what to do or say when we fought. No matter what I did or said, it was wrong. I was wrong. She was right. Apparently, when you signed your marriage certificate, one of the clauses in fine print read that your wife was always right even when she wasn’t. It read that you had to bury your balls during an argument and dig them back up at a later date when she wasn’t watching.

  It read: You lose, fucker! Always.

  All I could do was say sorry for the sake of saying sorry, because despite what Elton John thought, sorry was not the hardest word. But just as I was about to open my mouth and utter that ‘S’ word, there was a knock at the door. Thank fuck. I choose option number two instead.

  ‘I’ll get it,’ I said quickly, hightailing my arse out of the kitchen of contempt. Tash was a highly flammable substance and my absence seemed to be the retardant.

  Retardants were good. Retardants saved lives.

  Practically sprinting to the front door, I opened it to find Bryce, Alexis, Nate, Charlotte and baby Brayden. ‘Hi, guys, come in,’ I said enthusiastically, smiling at Brayden, who was perched like a prized parrot on Bryce’s arm. ‘Wow! Someone is gonna be as tall as his old man!’

  The pint-sized billionaire turned away and buried his head in his father’s chest. He didn’t like me either. Maybe he and Tash had been talking.

  ‘Bray, what’s up? You tired, buddy?’ Bryce asked, giving him a cuddle.

  I inwardly laughed. The ‘tired card’ was Parenting 101. If your child was being an arsehole, you just insinuated that they needed sleep. Now why can’t that work for adults? It was a crying shame, that’s what it was, because I’d just tell Tash she was tired, or I was tired, or we were both tired. Then we’d go to bed, fuck, sleep and wake up happy. If only it were that easy.

  Moving aside, I let them in, which was when I noticed what was in Alexis’s hand. ‘Oh no! You’re not thinking of bringing that in here are you? Tash will lose her shit.’

  Alexis pulled the string on the balloon and held it close to her chest. ‘It’s not for Tash. It’s for Thomas. See? It says “8 today”.’

  I let out a sardonic laugh. ‘You have a death wish. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.’

  ‘What’s a death wish?’ Charlotte asked as she walked past me.

  Nate gripped his sister’s shoulders from behind, shook her lightly, and spoke like a ghost. ‘A wish that brings deathhh.’

  She shrugged him off. ‘Don’t. Get off me. Who would wish for that?’

  ‘Your mother, apparently,’ Bryce answered, a rather impressive smirk on his face.

  Alexis raised her eyebrow, and the look she fired Bryce spoke nothing but sex. It was unmistakeable. Unbelievable. But it was there, like an inviting horny-as-fuck beacon. Wow! Why doesn’t Tash look at me like that when I insult her?

  According to my wife, Bryce’s smirk had the power to open Alexis’s legs. Every time. I hadn’t believed that statement for a second … until now. Now, I was definitely a believer.

  Hmm … I wonder if I can smirk like that, if it will cure Tash’s menhavepaws and open her legs? I considered giving it a try but decided against it. I wasn’t game enough. I preferred retardants.

  Turning to head back inside, I was just about to close the door when I spotted both Tash’s family and mine arriving.

  ‘Nonna!’ Thomas shouted, pushing past me and leaping over the threshold to our house. He bounded down our driveway and hugged my mother-in-law as she smoothed down his hair.

  ‘Why you grow so big? Non più in crescita, il mio piccolo angelo.’

  A derisive smile dripped from my face into a puddle of disdain. Here we go again. Bloody Italian.

  There were not many things I hated in life: the end of the financial year, pedestrians, the Collingwood Football Club, and when Tash’s family spoke Italian in front of me. Should I have learned the language over the years? Probably. But I hadn’t, because I was busy being everything to my wife and kids in English. Sure, I could decipher the odd word here and there, but that was about it. Everything else they said in quick succession I couldn’t figure out, and they knew it. It made me feel inferior and I despised that, especially under my own roof.

  ‘Come in,’ I said politely, greeting everyone as they approached the door. ‘I hope you brought your bathing suits. It’s gonna be a hot one.’

  My mother-in-law patted my cheek and laughed. ‘Io? In un costume da bagno? Ma tu sei pazza.’

  I laughed too, albeit hesitantly. In a room with a banjo. Matt will say pasta? What the fuck does that even mean?

  When it appeared no one else was exiting cars and making their way up our driveway, I closed the door and headed back inside, almost laying a loaf in my pants when Tash shrieked at the top of her lungs.

  ‘ALEXIS! You just couldn’t help yourself, could you?’

  I rounded the corner with speed and found Tash standing with her back against the fridge, hands splayed on the stainless-steel surface, Alexis holding the balloon not even a metre away.

  ‘Nope. What can I say? I’m amBITCHous. And anyway, every party should have at least one balloon.’

  ‘No, they shouldn’t.’

  ‘It’s a kids’ party!’

  ‘I don’t care!’

  Brayden grabbed at the balloon and it made a really loud high-pitched screeching noise. So did Tash, the colour draining from her face. Shit! Do I intervene? Do I save my cranky-arsed, menNOpausal wife?

  I didn’t know. It was an amber light situation
— stay put, or proceed with caution.

  Taking a step back, Alexis passed both Brayden and the balloon to Bryce. ‘Okay, okay. I’m sorry. It was just a joke. Are you all right? You don’t look too good.’ She placed her hand on Tash’s shoulder but it was quickly swiped away, and, before I could blink, Tash had latched onto Alexis’s hair and was slowly yanking it towards the ground.

  ‘Don’t do that again,’ Tash warned, her voice stern.

  Everyone in the room, including myself, gasped. Fuck me, she has gone crazy. My wife is certifiably insane. I didn’t know what to do. Approaching the deranged imposter was far from rational, yet the imposter was somehow my wife, and I had to stop her before she started tearing off limbs.

  About to risk my life and break them up, I paused when Alexis burst into laughter. ‘Ow! Fair enough. Damn it. How did you learn that move so quickly? You strike like a death adder.’

  ‘You are but a mouse and mere shadow to my self-defence brilliance,’ Tash taunted.

  Alexis tried to wriggle free. ‘Oh shut up and let me go.’

  ‘Do you solemnly swear to never balloon-bother me again?’

  ‘EVER?’

  Tash yanked a little harder. Shit! She’s vicious. Funnily enough, I kinda liked it and wanted to do the same to her while my cock was impaling her pussy.

  ‘Yes! Yes! Okay. I promise to never bother you with a balloon ever again.’

  Tash let go, and Alexis whacked her on the arm before hugging her.

  I was so confused.

  ‘Never knew Tash was into hair pulling. Go you!’ a familiar voice said at the same time my shoulder was nudged.

  I turned and found Carly — Tash and Alexis’s close friend — and her fiancé, Derek — Bryce’s best mate — standing beside me. ‘Yeah.’ I laughed, nodding half-heartedly. ‘My wife is full of surprises.’ I kissed Carly on the cheek and shook Derek’s hand. ‘How are you both? And thanks for coming.’

  ‘I haven’t come just yet,’ Carly replied, winking. ‘But it’s only a matter of time.’

  Derek pulled her to him, her back pressing against his chest. ‘Babe, you’re at a kids’ party.’

  She giggled. ‘And?’