You Can Go Home Again

Appliance Noir with an OCD chaser.

You Can Go Home Again

Grant just couldn’t remember. Had he turned it off? The gas stove. How could he be sure? This was a recurring theme every time he left the house. He couldn’t remember. Had he turned the knob back to neutral position after boiling the kettle for breakfast tea? He was sure he had. But how sure?

It was on his mind as he pulled into the parking lot for work. He did not want to call his wife to have her check. She’d be leaving for work soon. And he did not want to admit to her his weakness. Again. His obsession. Give her more fodder to minimize him.

He went about his workday. For ten minutes. It ate at him. He’d made a list of what to check before leaving the house. He’d remembered to make the list. But he forgot to check it. Had he turned off the dial? They really should switch to an electric range. Avoid this nonsense. He couldn’t concentrate. He was pretty sure he’d turned it off. But not 100 percent. Not sure enough. Risk reward. What was the benefit of not driving home. Who’d miss him at work? A mere 80 cents worth of gasoline to drive back. His wife would never know. She’d be gone by now. Compare that to the downside if he was wrong. Kaboom. So back he went. Home again home again home again home.

Straddle is one of those words like moist. It just sounds dirty even if used in a workaday manner. It is not a word you want to use upon entering a room as a passive observer to describe the behavior of your wife. (Nor is entering for that matter.) Yet that is where he found himself. And that was the right word, the only word, for the occasion. She was not at work as he’d expected. Instead, she was astride their hulking neighbor Davenport. Straddling the great lout. Grant watched for a short bit, unseen. Not as if there were any doubt. And not out of any prurient enjoyment, surely. He watched like he did most things. Out of habit.

He almost forgot why he’d come home. Almost forgot what he was afraid he’d forgotten.

He stopped by the kitchen on the way out. To check the knobs on the stove. That was what brought him back home in the first place.

Grant then left the house for the second time that day. This time he would not be back. Ever. This time the gas was in fact on.