The Dog Ate My Homework

Bread Crumbs

"I don't think that person knows how sandwiches work."

I would've agreed with the middle-aged lawyer who made the rather objective comment. But I couldn't. He didn't know my Robyn. He wouldn't understand.

I'd watched my wife the moment she stepped inside the diner. It was already past midnight and I was certain she wasn't expecting to be observed and judged at this late hour. Most hours of the day, she was cool and collected, seemingly unaffected by everything else going on around her.

At work, she was the ideal employee. She was confident, efficient and goal-oriented. At home, she was the ideal wife. She was perfect. She was selfless, she loved me unconditionally, and she made me want to be a better man.

Regrettably, a better man would not be hiding in the shadows, watching his wife crumble. Because that was what happened when she thought no one was looking. She crumbled.

Robyn had stepped in the diner, cool and collected. She ordered a clubhouse sandwich and brought it to her table. She sat down and said a prayer before her meal then she removed the toothpick and separated the top piece of bread. She used the knife to wipe the mayonnaise off the side of the bread.

Then she reversed her grip on the knife and started violently stabbing the sandwich. Furiously, she hacked away, bits of bread, bacon, lettuce and tomato flew in the air. Angry tears trickled down her cheeks as she kept attacking her meal till there was nothing left of the sandwich and steel hit glass.

The public prosecutor, the only other customer in the diner aside from the coward hiding in the gloom, hastily made an exit after commenting on my wife's activity. Considering what he did for a living, he most likely feared for his life. If he only knew that the true criminal wasn't the spirited vixen before him but the deserter in the dark.

When Robyn finally caught the attention of a sleepy server who then called the burly and cranky chef to deal with my wife, I decided to show myself. The cook had the built of a wrestler, but when he saw me, he immediately headed back to the pantry, dragging the scrawny attendant with him. I heard him lock the kitchen door and prattle prayers of deliverance.

If I weren't frightened myself, I would've found the staff's reaction amusing. I should thank my brother for showing me that trick with the beastly, prehensile tail. Not that it was of any use when I faced the wrath of my wife.

Who was now looking at me, the knife still tightly gripped in her hand.

And when she realized that I was looking back at her, she dropped the blade and it loudly clattered on the plate. She surreptitiously wiped away her tears with the back of her hand.

Why was she hiding this side of hers from me? Had she no faith in me? What had she been stabbing earlier? Whom had she been gouging earlier?

"F-Francis? What are you doing here?" Robyn asked, trying to piece back all her crumbled parts.

**

TheIlluminators