Salt

‘Passthesal’.

It was a grunt. Barely a word. Let alone three separate words. Or a please added on. Beginning or end – a please would have been appreciated at either point.

‘PASS THE SALT’.

This time the words were carefully pronounced. Louder. Almost like the words themselves could stand up, walk over, raise her hand, hold the salt and carry it over to his side of the table. They could have done before. Any word he uttered like that could have made her jump to attention. It was best to listen to what the words wanted and let them control you. If you didn’t let the words control you then a hand, an elbow or a foot would soon arrive and make sure you did what the words told you anyway. No please was tacked on either end of course – especially after the foot, elbow or hand arrived -they don’t arrive or leave with please.

‘PASS THE fucking SALT’. 

Ah, of course, now the whisper of a curse. Slowly seeping in like air passing through the pent-up air hole of a steam engine. Luckily, she knew she could let the air out today. Normally by the time the quiet, snake-like curse came slipping soundlessly through the air to her ears she was already holding part of her sore face or bending over awaiting another blow. But more than her own mind or soul she knew every part of his body, his mind, his patience, his emotion, his anger, his sadness. She knew every inch of his being because this being could knock her eye out of her socket if he felt like it. She had learned, after long and hard lessons, to listen and care for every movement, sigh and thought that passed through this man. Today was a good day. A let the air out day. For her. Because it had been for him. The two can only work together. He had successfully won in court and was joining his chambers for Christmas Eve drinks in an hour – an annual event that his colleagues and fellow barristers enjoyed each Christmas. She wasn’t invited of course. Her part of the festivities had already been completed – his newly cleaned and pressed shirt and trousers were pulled over his fat belly and she was pleased to see she had done a fine job of the creases. Such a good job that it would be a shame to stand up, raise his right hand into a fist and slam it into her stomach; that could ruin the whole look. Plus, he was older now, that kind of activity might even make him perspire on the perfect shirt. She knew she had a little more time before…

‘PASS the fucking SALT, you little deaf whore’.

There it is. The insult. Always small adjectives – little, tiny, insignificant. A disability reference – deaf, blind, ignorant, stupid. Definitely a reference to her promiscuity – prostitute, slut, tramp, tart. The last one always confused her the most. She had never actually had sex with anyone else but him. She was 17 and still a virgin when she first met him. She was tall (but always insults about being small) and had long blonde hair to her waist. In those days the style was completely straight hair with long floaty dresses or big flares. She was lucky really. Where other girls used an iron and tea towel to force the creases out of their hair she could wash, brush and walk outside to let the sun dry the poker straight strands. It was exactly this kind of sunny hair-drying day when she met him. He was taking the same bus into town from the university halls and she had accidentally left her purse in her student flat that she shared with three other girls. Don’t worry, he had said, I can help you. He smiled kindly, extended a hand, asked how she was. It was such a charming thing to do and then he walked her to her event. He walked her to every event after that. She hadn’t walked alone in many years. He never asked for the bus fare back and she had wished for the past 29 years that she had never taken it.

He was still eating his plate of sausages and mashed potatoes while he had demanded the salt. Even as the words tumbled out of his teeth rotting mouth, he managed to scoop another forkful of potato inside the gaping hole. She could hear the slapping of the mash bounce from lips to tongue and down his smoke damaged throat. Every slap, slush, slurp and gulp raised a little turn at the corners of her own perfectly closed mouth. Not a smile, of course. Just a little turn. Like the turn that was coming though he did not know it. A turn that was invisible to his beady dark eyes.

But now he looked up. She had still not moved, not spoken, not reacted to his very carefully constructed request. For a second, a small glimmer of confusion passed between his eyebrows as if one side of his brain was asking the other side of his brain what change had occurred. 

BANG.

His palm hit the table as he raised himself up to stand over her. Looks like a little slap might have to be administered even in the perfect shirt. As he raised himself higher than her seated position, he suddenly staggered back into his chair grasping at the edge of the table to steady himself. He hit the back of the chair hard and slumped slightly. His two thirds completed mashed potato and sausages rocked on the table. A little gravy splashed quietly and delicately onto the white marble table top. The marble was smooth and shiny. She knew that table top intimately. The back of her head had made forceful contact with it one Easter when she had bought the wrong sized garbage bags. The table underneath was as smooth as the top. She knew this intricately as she had focused on the underside of the table with all of her mind during one very difficult rape after he had lost an important case in court. There was a slight crack in the far-left corner that no one knew about but her. She now focused on the brown runny blob slowly moving across one or two millimeters of the white surface. She would not have to clean that up. She would never clean up anything in this house again.

He put both hands to his chest and let out a sound she hadn’t heard from him before. A cry from somewhere within his chest coming out of his mouth. His face contorted with what, she hoped, was pain. She allowed the corners of her still closed mouth to turn up a little more. He looked at her and reached out but the weight of his left arm in the air caused more pain and he stumbled slowly onto the floor. She looked down at the man who had once made her eat soil after accidentally knocking his carefully placed window plants in their first tiny apartment on Grafton Street. She suddenly felt hungry.

She stepped over the twisting and turning mass on the floor and took some mashed potatoes from the pan still on the stove. Potatoes that had not had a sprinkling of chemicals just before she served them. She picked up the salt shaker, a gift from her mother on their wedding day, and finally let her lips pull back to reveal her teeth as she showed him the salt before lightly sprinkling some onto the mashed potatoes. Her smile remained on her face as she finished every last bite of the potatoes she had cooked.

The contortion and quiet groans slowly stopped. She looked down to observe. Just as the rat had done. No difference. If she had been able to continue her career in pharmaceuticals as she had wanted, she would have known how to write up this part of the experiment more accurately. As it was, she was satisfied with the outcome and that would have to do. She found her mobile near the toaster and called an ambulance. While waiting for the paramedics to arrive, she realized this may be her last chance to speak honestly to her dead husband before her new life could begin. She remembered his last words: ‘Pass the salt’.

‘NO’, she shouted into the silent kitchen in her silent house.