Teenage love story - Part I
If you are wondering why, and what perhaps I have done with the other Alison, read the post below.
Susannah tore down the highway at one hundred kilometers per hour. This would have to be the most infuriating day she had had to live through for a long time. First, one of the other girls in the office at work had called in sick so she’d had twice as much work to do and then phone decided to ring incessantly and the shrill noise of its cry to be heard had given her a throbbing headache. That weekend she’d been seen strolling up the street with a “young handsome man” who was actually her cousin by one of the smart young accountants at the office and after announcing to the whole building that she was having an affair had proceeded to jibe her about it all day, making her more furious than ever.
A thousand little things had gone wrong. She had sent her milkshake frothing all over the report her boss had given her to type and then had to spend most of the afternoon trying to decipher the smudged scrawl which was practically illegible in the first place and all the while her nose kept dripping like a tap due to a cold she caught on the weekend because of the miserable weather and she only had two tissues which were used as sparingly as possible before the afternoon had seen her dashing across the street to buy some more and now, she was just ten minutes from home when great drops of rain started splashing on her windscreen and she had gotten [is that a word?] up early that morning to do a couple of loads of washing which were presently on the line and would be saturated before she got to them [longest sentence ever].
Susannah was now in a rotten mood and on her way home to a pigsty to try and make tea for a starving husband, clean up the mess and finish her typing. What a day!
The tyres screeched on the already slippery, wet road as her Laser careered off the highway into Burnside Avenue where their modest little house was located at number eight. After jerking to a halt in the driveway she dashed around the back to try and salvage some of her washing then stormed inside where her husband, Mark, was already trying to set some order to the kitchen and threw it in a heap on an armchair.
“Well Honey,” greeted her husband, approaching her with a warm smile, but, seeing the angry flash in her eyes and the scowl on her face continued with concern:
“What’s upsetting my little wife today?” which was a nickname he’d called her ever since they were married, whenever he was feeling particularly loving.
“Don’t ever say wife to me, it’s too cold!” she spat back at him.
A little surprised at this objection to his pet name for her he tried to make a little joke out of her statement, to ease the tension.
“Oh, come on Honey!”, he laughed, “What’ll I refer to you as when I introduce you to a business associate”, but the joke was lost and Susannah replied:
“If someone asks who I am then tell them I am the one you love!” with venom in her voice. At this Mark’s eyebrows shot up and seeing his expression Susannah added with another outburst, “And if they quiver, ‘Are you married?, then say that we are sharing our lives together,” before she marched out of the room to go and get changed.
Most of the time Mark enjoyed his wife’s spirit but lately things seemed to be really getting to her so he tried to think of a way to get her to unwind and relax a bit.
He walked into the loungeroom and put on her favourite track, which was the sound track from a movie ‘The Princess Bride’ and then started to wash the dishes. He regretted not having remembered about the washing on the line, but he’d only got in the door five minutes before his wife and it would’ve been wet anyhow. At least it would have been a thoughtful gesture and cheered his wife a little.