Vibrations

Chapter 1

For our one-month anniversary, Alyssa had bought me this stupid little ceramic bear. He fit in the palm of your hand, nothing big, nothing fancy. He was a cutesy little affectation, not like a real bear, but more like a ceramic version of a teddy bear. He was sitting on his butt, an ice cream cone in his little hand, or paw, whatever you wanted to call it. He had a little dopy smile on his face, little yellow bow tie, tied around his neck. We had been out at a carnival, and she had seen it at this little booth as we walked past and just bought it for me on the spur of the moment.

She handed it to me with a little shy smile on her face, "Happy anniversary." She mumbled as she handed it to me, like she was self-conscious about it, like maybe I'd look at it and say, 'this is stupid', or I'd tell her it wasn't enough...

It was one of those cutesy little moments all couples seem to have. One little innocuous moment that either meant nothing, or everything depending on the couple.

I was a little disappointed to see him sail across the room at my head...

I was even more disappointed to see him shatter into a million pieces as I ducked him. I felt the hundreds of sharp little pieces of him bounce around the room, trying desperately to shred my flesh. I held my arm up over my face, deciding to sacrifice the arm to save my face. It's not much of a face, but it's all I have...

The bitch of it all was it was Alyssa that had thrown him at me...

Guess she hadn't liked that bear as much as I had.

"I know you're fucking around on me!" She screamed.

Sad thing was, I wasn't fucking around on her...

I'm stupid. I'm selfish. I'm really not much of a provider. I don't even like myself all that much...

One thing I am however, is loyal.

My cell phone, nestled into the front pocket of my jeans, started ringing again. The shrill air raid siren that I had made my ring tone belting out into the room. I was really starting to regret that ringtone, though, right now, with a furious, and semi-crazy woman shredding my belongings as she screamed at me like a banshee, an emergency air raid siren might be a little more appropriate than I was willing to admit to myself...

Alyssa was short, maybe five-five to my full six feet. She was a spark plug, however, and she knew how to make the most of what god had given her. What she lacked in intimidation factor, she more than made up for in sheer voluminous energy. At the sound of my phone going off, the third time in as many minutes she got right up in my face.

"Why don't you want to answer your phone? Is it your whore calling?" She sneered into my face.

Part of me wanted to tell her I didn't answer the phone because I didn't want to throw any more gasoline on the fire of her insanity... there were plenty more breakable items in my house and her flinging them around willy-nilly probably wasn't doing me any favors both with the neighbors, and in terms of my security deposit...

Considering she had lost so much control that she was hurling ceramic bears around the room... I decided it was better, and more than likely quite a bit smarter, to keep my mouth shut.

She blew up like this about once every two weeks. One time it would be her insistence I was cheating on her. The next that I was cheating on her because I had watched some porn. The time after that, I wasn't working enough. The time after that, I worked too much.

One time she had blown up like this because there were no steaks in the freezer...

I was beginning to think she might be a little crazy.