The Smell of the Coffee is Bad

INT. SCHMID'S DINING ROOM - MORNING

ALAN SCHMID(43) rubs his nose. There’s a smell here, and by golly, it’s ruining his bacon pancakes. He looks over to his daughter, JASMINE SCHMID(17), who’s sitting across from him. She’s on her phone scrolling through Instagram, her brunette hair pinned to the side in what she would call ‘retro seventies style-ish.’ She munches on her food, like a goat who has all the time in the world.

Alan doesn’t mind it. He really doesn’t care. At the stove cooking up these fantastic bacon pancakes is GRETTA SCHMID(41). Her hair is a curly mess, and her hand is on her hip as she mindlessly looks down at the sizzling bacon and bubbling pancakes. She’s in shorts that tight around the waist and legs. She’s wearing Alan’s custom-made t-shirt that reads, ‘No patty! No Jamaican.’ A relic from his church group. He never liked the font of the shirt, so he barely even wore it.

So far, everything looks normal. The sun beaming through the overgrown tree that he was supposed to cut three months ago. The collected dust on the countertops, a byproduct of forgotten cleaning. A messy floor that could use some sweeping. Everything is the way it seems. Or it should be…

… It’s that smell that’s got Alan all befuddled. He can’t pinpoint where it is coming from? It’s everywhere and close to him all at the same time.

He brings his coffee up to his nose. He sniffs. “The smell of the coffee is bad,” he announces. He glances over to Gretta.

“Why are you so weird?” Jasmine asks. She doesn’t look up at him. Whatever is on her phone is way more important.

“What? The coffee smells bad. How is that weird? It should be concerning.”

“Your wording.”

“What’s wrong with the coffee, Alan?” Gretta asks, flipping over a pancake. Alan doesn’t like that she doesn’t call him babe or honey. She hasn’t called him that since their twenties.

“It smells off. It could be the room as well, like it smells of Febreze, pancakes, bacon, and… fish.”

“I smell the Febreze, not the fish.”

“Of course you would say that.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Gretta asks, turning to him. 

Alan crosses his arms and leans back. “I know what fish smells like, and this is some promiscuous fish.”

“Promiscuous? Say it with your chest, Alan. Enough beating around the bush.”

“You fucking somebody in my kitchen?”

“Dad,” Jasmine says, glancing at him.

“What? It’s an honest question.”

“Are we doing this right now?” Gretta asks, shutting off the stove with a quick flick. “Cause I know you don’t want to be doing this right now.”

Alan takes a sip of coffee, nodding vigorously that indeed he wants to be doing this right now. “I have done nothing but provide for this family.” He counts on his hand. “I pay for the food, your phone, her phone,” he points to Jasmine.

“Please don’t pull me into this,” she says.

“I pay for the clothes on your back, the jewels around your neck. I pay heating, the water—”

“We pay for that, stupid,” Gretta interrupts.

“No, we don’t.”

“Yes, we do. You came to me ten years ago, crying your eyes out that you weren’t being man enough to provide, and I said I would help. I got a job, now a career, and WE pay for these things.”

“I don’t remember that.”

“Oh, you don’t remember, convenient. I guess you don’t remember Crystal jumpin’ up and down on your bones.”

Jasmine glances to her mom, wide-eyed. She can’t believe what she’s hearing from her mother. “Who’s Crystal?”

“Tell her, Alan. Who this bitch be?” Gretta places her hands on her hip, her weight shifting to one foot. Oh, you know it. It’s the stance of a pissed woman.

“She ain’t a bitch, and I have had no sexual relations with that woman.”

“She’s having sexual relations with you.”

“Dat don’t make no sense.” Alan says, looking to his daughter. “Crystal is a co-worker of mine.”

“Oh,” Jasmine says, taking in that information. 

“A co-worker that you go on business trips with for weeks on weeks.” Gretta mentions.

Alan, dumbfounded, can’t decide if he should nod or say something. His mouth switching through all the possible formations and his head jittering in the same. “She’s a single woman who don’t need no man. Sure, she’s a beautiful young woman, but that’s it.”

“Uh-huh.”

“W-what about you and Jeff?”

“The neighbour?” Jasmine asks.

“What about Jeff?” Gretta crosses her arms.

Alan takes notes, and a grin grows on his smug face. “Yeah, that white bastard in the three-story house that is arrogantly placed across from ours that I have to see every fucking morning when I wake up. You guys spend a lot of time together.”

“We’re in the same book club, idiot. Something you don’t do.”

“What, read? I’m too busy for that.”

“Jeff’s not.”

“Mom, you’re not helping your case.” Jasmine says.

“Shut up, Jasmine,” Gretta says, closing her eyes. She takes a moment to recompose herself. There’s a list of comebacks she has loaded. No need to hold back. “Jeff is my friend. I would even go so far as to say he’s my best friend, something you obviously failed at since you’re more worried about making the money and having everyone in the house be in debt to you. Fucking ego.”

“So you’re fucking him?” Alan asks.

“I’m not fucking you, obviously.”

Alan stands there flabbergasted. He can’t believe it. Is she confessing? It sounds like a confession. All these years of trying to make it work. Is it all ending here? Why the hell had they had Jasmine for? If he had known that this was the kind of woman he married seventeen years ago, he would have left her right away. Well, he thinks he would have left her right away. “So just like your father, then?”

“Oh my god,” Gretta says, rolling her eyes. “Don’t bring him into this.”

“I think I will. Since he also cheated on his partner.”

“I’m not fucking Jeff.”

“Sure, sure, and I’m not fucking Crystal. You know I never liked your father. There was something about him that just always rubbed me the wrong way. The way he tries to be such a good man, trying his best to cover his ass and make himself look better than he is.”

“Isn’t that what you do?” Jasmine says.

“No. I am an honest man.” Alan begins to pace back and forth in the kitchen, “And never once in my life have I ever thought of an affair,” his hands behind his back as he spins around on a dime, facing his family.

Gretta and Jasmine both look at him. They think he’s full of shit, and he’s probably is. There’s no way in all of his forty-three years of being a man that he’s never had a vulgar thought.

“He tried to make it work,” Gretta says.

“So do I. I work hard to please you.”

An eyebrow raises on Gretta’s face. “Like how you please me in bed.”

“I please you.”

“Your four inches can’t please yourself.”

“Excuse you, it’s not about size. It’s about how you use it, and I’m well more than four inches… underneath.” He says, with the last part under his breath. “Anyway, your fake moans and flabby body are at fault if they can’t get me going.”

“Dad,” Jasmine yells out. “What the hell?”

“I’m being honest,” Alan says. He looks over to his wife. Her face is of stone, carved with a nasty scowl. The type of scowl that could end with a husband missing on the news or eating something he’s not supposed to. Maggots.

“You want honesty, Alan. You’re a fucking waste.” Gretta says, in a cold tone. It freezes the air. “You care so much about what’s in your wallet and how fucking hard you work. You’re out here buying everyone’s love and expecting us to treat you like some fucking god. You think you’re a saint?” Alan opens his mouth to speak. “Don’t. I already know what you’re going to say. That you’re not a saint and that you’re misunderstood. I’m tired, Alan. I’m tired of you, your four-inch pecker, your ego, and your stupid money. I bet you would relish it if we divorced and I found myself homeless with some druggie. No one is holding you here. I’m already making more money than you. The house is pretty much paid for. You don’t do the laundry, you don’t clean, you don’t cook, and you barely do any of the yard work. I asked you to cut that tree by the window three months ago. Jeff did it for us, free of charge, because he knew you would be busy. I didn’t even ask. He told us he knows you have a lot on your plate. Funny how the man you think I’m cheating with is the same man that’s trying to look out for you.”

Alan stares at her, trying to keep himself from falling apart. Gretta isn’t wrong, but she isn’t right either. Alan knows better than anyone how complex he is, but for some reason everything she says hits him hard. He doesn’t clean. He doesn't do anything around the house or the yard. He knows she gets paid more than he does. He sees it with every paycheck. It bothers him. He thinks it doesn’t, but it does. It burns to know that Jeff is actually helping him out, but Alan won’t admit it. “I didn’t ask him for that.”

“I know.” Gretta says. “You don’t ask for anything. You just order everyone around.”

The three let the mounted clock tick on in the all-consuming silence. The bacon gone cold along with the pancakes. The morning sun looks a bit dull now, and the dusty countertop looks a bit nostalgic.

“The table is different,” Jasmine confesses. A little late and probably not enough to repair the damage.

“What do you mean?” Alan asks.

“The table is different. I thought you guys were gonna notice right away, but you didn’t. The fish smell…” Jasmine swallows. “… is from me.”

“I’m not following.”

“Oh my god,” Gretta says, piecing it together.

“What am I not getting?”

“Mark and I had sex when you guys were out last night… on the table. I knew it was a bad idea, but Mark really wanted to, and I kinda wanted to. Anyway, we had sex, and when Mark — you know — uogh,” she makes an orgasm face. A face she thinks Mark made, but she can’t remember. “And the table broke. We panicked, and we got another table from Jones. We noticed the smell after we came back with the table and Febreezed the place.”

Alan retakes his seat. He looks down at his bacon pancakes. He looks over to Gretta, who’s looking at their daughter. He thinks there’s a lot to digest. He thinks there isn’t enough bacon and pancakes in the world to fix this.

Gretta turns on the stove and resumes making the rest of breakfast. She doesn’t want to think about this anymore. The quicker she finishes making breakfast, the faster she can put this all behind her.

Jasmine opens her phone and starts scrolling through Instagram again. She eats the rest of her food. Maybe they’ll get through this.

Maybe not.