How's Your Wife?

I know Larry from work but also because he went to high school with my wife. Sometimes he'll say "How's Sheryl?" or "How's your wife?" and I'll tell him something funny like "still slutty." Small talk from a small man as my wife would say. But this morning, well first off Larry went way around the back way through the copy room and he never goes that way because he drinks coffee in the morning and the coffee machine is right across from my cubicle but this morning I saw him double back that other way so that's strange for starters and then at lunch when I saw him in the cafeteria he started fumbling with his phone like he was willing it to ring but it didn't. Then when I say "hey Larry, how they swinging?" his face gets flush like I just asked him to squeeze my balls and he says "yeah" and I says "yeah, what?" and then that's when it happens.

"How's your wife?" he says but not normal like every other day it's all in slow motion like "how ...'s .... you....r....wi....fe?" and the corner of his mouth turns inside out then starts flicking up and down like some kinda weird tick and I can see panic in his eyes and he stumbles backward like I just socked him in the guts but I didn't even touch him.

Then all of a sudden there's no blood in my head. My hands and feet are tingling like how when you sit on them for too long and my stomach is warm, so warm like gross warm, and this is what people feel like when they get stabbed or more like when their throats get slit. Next thing I know I'm on the floor and Hector and Karen are touching my face and saying things but where's Larry? He's gone home they say, wasn't feeling well.

Then the end of the day comes around like it does every other day and I start back to thinking about what happened earlier in the morning and at lunch time and it hits me in the brain what my body somehow caught on to hours ago. And I always said I would never be mad at the other guy because I ain't married to him but the rage was coming and I was grabbing stuff like things that could maybe do some damage and Larry's fucking tick face was the only thing I could see through the mist of anger. Lucky he went home early I guess although a stapler was about the worst of it and that's the kind of thing that ends up on YouTube, some middle aged arsehole stapling some other middle aged arsehole in the neck or in the earhole or something.

Then I drive home yelling at some lady who didn't use her blinker and I call her a cunt and think about bashing her face in with a cricket bat and then when I pull up into the driveway I notice that the lights are off. Not one light on in the house and the dog is out back barking, high pitched like someone just ruined his life.

The only thing I can think to do is put my pyjamas on, crawl into bed, and watch a few episodes of the Gilmore Girls. Because that's what we always do on Monday nights.