I died over breakfast.
She stabbed me in the back with a kitchen knife. Straight through the heart, a lightning in spring skies.
Most of my body shut down before my head hit the plate. A thud and clattering of plates.
It took me a moment to realise what was going on. My cheek lay in the warm rubbery mess that Eva called scrambled eggs.
I tried to lift my head. It only went up an inch and plonked back on the plate. A piece of burned bacon poked my eye.
I saw the bitch through my morning glass of whisky, her bony figure distorted by the amber liquid. She had her hand cupped around the mouth and was shaking. One of her eyes was black and swollen, the other wide open and staring at me.
“What ya looking at?” I tried to say. My lips barely moved. Like the mouth of a fish, no sound.
I became aware of the taste of iron in my mouth. It came and disappeared. The smell of eggs and burned bacon vanished next and then I lost the feeling of my cheek on the plate.
I was suddenly up, staring at Eva. She was breathing in quick, shallow sips. Something wasn’t right. I could feel it. I looked around and froze…
I was gazing at my own body, slumped on a chair, the bold back of my head shiny in the morning sun. I saw the knife sticking out of me and felt weightless.
I heard clatter and creaking of drawers behind me. Eva had disappeared. I darted toward the noise.
In the living room, I found her kneeling on the floor near the window. The room was a mess of opened sideboards, drawers pulled and thrown on the carpet and all sorts of knick knacks lying around.
What was she doing? I crossed the room and knelt beside her. She was… stuffing jewellery under a floorboard!
“Eva, why are you putting that there?” I yelled. The bitch acted like she couldn’t hear me, kept stuffing gold under the floor. I reached to grab her wrist. My fingers just kept grabbing through her hand. I couldn’t feel a touch, couldn’t hold her.
I recoiled. Stared at her wrist. It was bruised. I must have done that before. When she tried to hide my drink… or when she gave me one of her stupid fucking looks.
She replaced the floor board and jumped up. I saw her eyes for a moment, one open and the other swollen shut. Her cheeks were red, the groove under her nose shone with snot.
“Where the hell are you going, Eva?” I screamed behind her as she scurried back into the kitchen.
She rummaged in the kitchen drawers, pulling a hammer and a screwdriver. What was that about?
Eva hurried out of the back door and into the garden. I followed her but she slammed the door in my face. I braced for the wooden leaf to smash onto my nose. I heard the slam but felt no pain. I opened my eyes and was outside, next to her. I could go through closed doors?
Eva bent over and put the screwdriver against the lock. She swung the hammer and bang- she hit the handle. She drew a deep breath and hit it again… Bang… The third time, the lock gave in and projected inside the kitchen like a bullet. What was going on?
Eva ran back into the house. She put my tools back in the drawer and picked up her phone from the counter. Her trembling fingers ran across the display.
“911, what’s your emergency?” I heard a faint voice from the phone’s speaker.
“Help!” Eva cried, her voice breaking. “Please… Intruders… They came through the back door. I think… I think they killed my husband… Help… I tried to stop them, but they hit me…”
I stood there looking at that treacherous bitch. Was she really doing this?
I was burning. I jumped across the room and placed my hands on her throat but they just went through. Only a slight shiver rocked through her, as she sobbed and lied to the emergency operator. I exploded. Flailed my arms. Screamed. No effect of me on anything! Not even the curtains trembled.
Sirens blared. Cops and paramedics burst in, took over “the scene”. My corpse was put in a black bag. The “poor victim of a robbery gone wrong” was being treated by a cow resembling female paramedic.
“They stabbed my husband and when I tried to fight them, they hit me…”
“Why don’t you tell them the truth, bitch?” I growled, no one hearing me. “I gave you that black for ruining my eggs again and you deserved it.”
“… After they attacked us in the kitchen, they went into the living room…” Eva sobbed and shook like an autumn leaf in mid fall. “I think I heard them bagging jewelry.”
I just stood there, dumbstruck in my own kitchen, watching the circus that bitch Eva had created.
***
It’s all over now. Everyone’s gone. The linoleum is scrubbed, my breakfast is in the trash and my drink poured down the drain. The living room is tidy.
It’s evening and Eva is in our bedroom. I sit in the armchair next to the bed and watch her. The night lamp casts a soft, yellow light on her swollen eye. How often did I hit her? She sighs as her head touches the pillow.
Eva stares through me, her intact eye wide open, brimming. Her shoulder suddenly begins to shake. She breaks into tears.
I watch her in the darkness. Swollen and beaten, crying into the pillow. Quiet… As if I was alive and would get annoyed and smash my fist into her face again.
“Eva,” I try to call. I reach to her and try to wipe her tears. My fingers brush against her cheek and sink into her wet skin.
[Imaged Credit : Photo by Bhautik Patel on Unsplash]
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Great story, Stefan! Darkly humorous, full of wonderfully descriptive imagery. I especially like the opening, when the narrator describes the minutiae of his own demise, identifying and getting used to being dead, like that eye poked by a piece of burned bacon, or attempting to speak, but making no sound, like the mouth of a fish. Fabulous!