Premio finalista con cuento "Game over" en concurso literario "My brother Jack Literary Festival"

Game over

He didn’t love her. She didn’t love him either. He didn’t think of her as intelligent enough. Neither did she. (Of him).  He didn’t think high of her. Did she think high of him? He couldn’t tolerate her apathy. She couldn’t stand his hyperactivity. However, there they were: married and together for almost fifty years.  

Three grown up children wouldn’t let them take any step you devil modern creatures might be thinking about. Serenity. Patience. Comprehension. That’s what you two need now, they used to tell their parents (Is this school? Serenity, patience…. they wondered).

At weddings he used to get anxious, his left foot tapping the floor inadvertently, on a rhythmic dance that drove her crazy. She used to cry so quietly, each tear taking endless minutes to reach the corner of her mouth. Weddings were like funerals for them, only with better food and music. They reminded them of their own, half a century ago. “Half a century, God bless you!”. Not exactly the words of wisdom they wanted to hear, but you know how people and clichés go together. “You should celebrate your golden wedding”. Another cliché. They used to smile half-way. She used to move her head up and down saying “A nod is as good as a wink…”. He used to shake his head from side to side and completed the phrase: “…to a blind horse”. Just to be on the opposite side, you know.

In fifty years he never complained. His job took him to remote places all over Australia, and from time to time, when abundance was the norm, he would even stay up North for five weeks in a row, or down South for four. As long as he had a rest from her.  Not that she missed him, you might have guessed by now. She spent her time wisely, knitting for the needy, feeding the hungry, rising three children, making some pocket money from ironing skirts for busy businessmen’s wives’ sake (so that they can have a life, unlike her). The church and the synagogue, the Red Cross and The Smith Family, they all had priority and came way before his husband’s needs. “You’ve got your own two feet, your own two hands, your very own brain and mouth. You can work, they can not”. He called her naïve. She called him greedy. He named her “Silly Sweetie”, she started calling him “Darling Greedy”. Not too bad, all things considered.

June 13. The day was approaching scarily soon. June 13 and fifty years waiting to be celebrated, praised, crowned. None of them was willing to participate in any compulsory ceremony that their un-compassionate three children might be preparing with the active connivance of the couple’s few friends. Susan and Edward, Marc and Yvonne, Diana and Peter, Lynette and Adrian. Not to mention the four old maids in their seventies -four sisters who have been their neighbours in the quiet town of Altona Hills, back in the sixties, and who have never married (or even dated, according to Darling Greedy’s very own private investigations). 

As the days passed, the feeling of an anxious discomfort grew bigger and larger in her big mind and tiny body. The sole idea of being the centre of attention at a grand function (as they call it nowadays) and to have to smile and greet, hug her husband and even kiss him, represented an insult to her free-spirited nature. But nothing would make her surrender to their wicked (although well intended, she acknowledged) feet. Hence, she decided to outsmart them all. Do they want to organize a surprise golden wedding anniversary for us? Do they want to pretend that love lasts forever, that companionship follows passion, that fifty years only strengthen the bonds of marriage? Do they want to believe that we still kiss on the lips, write love letters and hold hands at night? Let the show begin!

The following morning and for the first time in twenty five years she applied on her tissue-like cheeks a thin layer of make-up. The redness of its better days had faded away (mind you, she had bought that Lancôme blush in their trip to Bali thirty years ago and it has been sitting on the top shelf –unopened- ever since) but the blush still gave a pink boost to her appearance. And mascara –that would be nice, she thought, but refused the idea seconds later not only because she did not own any, but because she definitely didn’t want to give her whole game away. Me wearing black thick mascara would be like him wearing tight underwear. 

She opened the tall, thick doors of her antique cedar wood wardrobe and casted her tiny deep eyes over the clothes. It looked as if her eyelids were sweeping the dust away from them. She’s been wearing the same jacket and the same skirt for the last countless years. Well – not exactly “the same” ones: she had one same skirt in seven different colours… that matched one same jacket in seven different colours. It made her feel so nauseous suddenly. How boring. How extremely boring. “I’ve surely had some sort of enlightenment at least once, back then when I used to go shopping. There has to be something there, hiding between the hangers or up there on the shelves. A purple shirt, or a flattering dress, something, anything, any garment to catch his numb attention” – she said, or thought (or both). Even a stupid little black dress would meet my goal. And sure enough, low and behold she discovered a perfectly folded silk blouse in its original package. The colour? Hard to describe. Definitely not red, most definitely not brown. Let’s agree that it fell somewhere in the calm range of the blues. 

He was sitting in the kitchen, newspaper in one hand, an un-lit cigarette in the other. He had quit smoking ten years ago but could never overcome the frightening feeling of emptiness between his index and middle fingers. For a whole decade during breakfast he’s been holding a cigarette that would never be smoked. Pure stupidity, she thought. None of her business, he reflected. More than once temptation seduced him with lustful proposals, and more than once he was about to fall in its sweet trap, but her wife’s firm look (should we say gaze?) of each morning made him shake away the dream and the idea, the temptation and the pleasure.

Her look. Her judgemental look. How he hated it, and how dependable he was of it at the same time. However, that sunny morning as she entered the kitchen at eight thirty five, her first words were not that idiotic cigarette again but a much nicer “Good morning, darling greedy”. It took him by surprise, but as he was immersed in an interesting article about the election process in Zimbabwe, could not react with an immediate response. She was disappointed, but forty nine years in the “wife business” had taught her to be patient and kind, kind and patient. 

Without asking she made him coffee. Black, no sugar, water at a hundred and eighty degrees, in the tall mug, the one that lacked a handle. He loved to put his frozen hands around the silky porcelain silhouette, particularly in winter. A female usage, she used to sentence . A great way of saving on gas, he used to praise himself.  She used to hate that view –him sitting with his curved back leaning on the paper, his wrinkled, big hands around the mug, the unlit cigarette next to it, waiting to be held, eternally unused… like her-.

But she had a game to play:

-Any good news today? – she offered him the inviting cup of coffee feigning a smile.

He looked up, not exactly understanding the changes. As he was about to accept the warm black liquid from her white hands, he saw her blue blouse (or was it green?), noticed a different pigment in her face. 

-Zimbabwe, the elections. 

-And what else? – she brought the old stainless steel stool and placed it next to his wooden white chair. She sat there calmly. So close that she could even feel the smell of the deadly nicotine. It made her shake her head with disgust: however, she said nothing, keeping the rules of her own little game in mind.

He was surprised, puzzled, maybe even a little bit scared. When was she going to say her usual “That unlit cigarette makes me feel sick, I’d rather see you smoking it and die than see you holding it like a sad desperate lunatic” ? When was she going to shoot her eyes at him, make a derogative comment, give him The Look?

She felt a bit unusual in her new role, but decided to continue the pretending game till the end of the days. Or, at least, until the thirteen of June, the golden wedding anniversary big “happy” celebration day. What a farce! 

The following morning he was sitting quietly again, same cigarette, same chair, same stooped position, updated newspaper. She walked into the kitchen wearing red. And a hat.  She made him coffee in the handle-free mug and handed it to him with a smile. 

He could not understand the new scenario quite well, but would not dare finding out either. In any case, he was still waiting for the stab, the condemning look, The Gaze.

-Any good news today, darling greedy?

-A devastating storm. In California.

-And what else? 

-Nothing much, silly sweetie, nothing much.

In the afternoons she started knitting him a scarf. In between her visits to all charity organizations that had her as a patron, she found time for it. It started as a little joke to herself: Let´s prove Mr. Darling Greedy that I can knit for his needs as well. As the days passed, and the scarf grew longer and thicker, she begun to forget her initial irony and started to sing while she knitted, her fingers quickly fixing any loose thread. 

He began to answer in longer sentences. In the mornings, as she gave him the freshly prepared black coffee in the silky porcelain mug and asked him: “Any news today, darling greedy?”, he no longer gave her a two-words answer, but read her the whole interesting piece of news instead  - in a loud, yet smooth voice. She listened attentively, as if the word from God was being read at that very same moment. The word from God.

The anniversary day was approaching fast. Susan and Edward, Marc and Yvonne, Diana and Peter, Lynette and Adrian and the four old maids were actively organizing music and catering, invitations, decoration and speeches. Susan new her from High School, Marc new him from a first job, back in nineteen fifty two. Yvonne met her at a Charity function, Peter met him at the Races. And the four old maids, well, we already know. We could say they all knew the couple very well and as such, buy organising the golden wedding anniversary day, were trying to convey a message of commitment to tradition more than a celebration of true love. They knew the couple and their roughness, their tense understanding, their endless lack of compassion to each other, their constant little hurting fights. But fifty years were not something to be ignored, by all means, so there they were, digging in their memories to find material that would enable them to write that beautiful yet credible speech, to play that memorable song (did they have any?), to  reincarnate a fifty year old happy wedding in a day. What a farce! 

At night she started wearing a gown. Black, silky, long, new. She asked him to undo the bottoms –strategically located at the back- and thank him with a smile. He began to cut his nails once a week. To shave every day. To fold his pyjamas the way she liked it:

-Thank you, darling greedy.

-A pleasure, silly sweetie.

The days passed. The mornings saw her making black coffee; the afternoons discovered her knitting and smiling, hamming and singing; the nights unveiled her wearing silky black night gowns. An endless spiral of development. 

The following morning (one of them, one of the many following mornings) she wore a purple dress. She applied a thin layer of pink blush on her cheeks. She pressed the lipstick gently against her slightly cracked red lips, in slow circular motions. She put shadow on her eyes. And mascara. Headed to the kitchen, made black coffee, no sugar, the water at one hundred and eighty degrees, poured it into the mug that lacked the handle and gave it to him:

-Any good news today, darling?

-A general power cut, in Minnesota. Listen, sweetie, listen to this…

And as he started reading the whole article to her, she moved her stainless steel stool closer to his wooden white hair, making little noise not to interrupt him, closer, to be able to hear, much closer, and a little bit more, so close, that she could even see the date written on the left corner of the wide open newspaper.

June 13.

He read. She listened. He put her neat hand on hers. She smoothed out his new scarf. He forgot to hold the unlit cigarette. She gave him an approving look. He said they are waiting for you at that Charity thing. She said they can do without me just today. He hugged her. She smiled. 

He loved her. She lost the game: loved him as well. ⬥