What's Left

I was inspired to write this after Selah posted "Love Poem" by Richard Brautigan:

What’s Left

He tells her he thinks she should write her mother. “Explain to her how you feel,” he says. “If you do it in writing,” he says, “she won’t have the chance to cut you off.” She doesn’t want to hear about her mother or what he thinks. She walks away.

He passes her in the kitchen and she says, “You are to blame for a lot of what has happened.” He calls her a cunt. She’s used to being called a cunt. She’s doesn’t care what he says, he’d never admit a wrong. He says he’s not to blame, “That stupid cunt bitch astrology loving mother of yours is a no good asshole. I’ve said from the beginning that she’s a stupid cunt bitch. I hate that fucking cunt.”

Her mother is no longer a part of her life.

When her father died earlier this summer, she began stripping away parts of her life that no longer needed to be.

She’s cleaning the toilet, their toilet, when he places the box that needs a shipping label on the desk, her desk. He stops to watch her clean the toilet. He leaves and she hears him sit on the couch and watch tv. He’s watching Home Improvement. She thinks to herself that he needs a personal improvement and for the first time that day, smiles. She finishes scrubbing the toilet and takes the gloves to the kitchen. She notices he is drinking a beer. It is 11 am.

She prints a shipping label, places it inside the box that needs to be shipped, and carries the box to the kitchen table. He has placed a roll of scotch tape inside the box that needs to be shipped. The label is ½ the size of a piece of loose leaf paper and the top of the box still needs to be sealed, too. There is not enough tape to do everything and they are out of packaging tape, so she leaves the box and the label on the kitchen table. She goes back to what she was doing.

She’s dusting the office when he yells from the living room over the tv that the box needs to go out in today’s mail. She says they are out of packaging tape. He does not reply.

She has finished cleaning the bathroom, kitchen, office and living room. She has changed the sheets, did the laundry, ran the dishwasher, de-pooped the back yard, and is now creating cover letters for various jobs. He comes into the office and asks her what she is doing. She says she is writing cover letters. “Why?” he asks. “You are a stupid lazy bitch with no work ethic. I told you that package needed to go out in today’s mail. The mail man just pulled up outside and you still don’t have the fucking package on the front step.” “I told you we were out of packaging tape hours ago,” she says. “Well then, stupid, you should have gone to get some,” he says.

He watches the mail man drive away from the front porch and yells inside, “Way to go stupid retard!” Inside he says, “The package didn’t go out.” She tells him that in the time he has spent bitching at her while watching tv and drinking beer he could have went and got packaging tape, sealed up the box, and put it in today’s mail. He says he has to do everything.

He takes the car somewhere. She feels like she needs to get out. She gets on her bike. She ends up at the library. She goes inside, turns around, and leaves. She sits on a bench. She people watches. She wonders what a stupid fat lazy dumb cunt bitch looks like. She takes a picture of herself with her phone’s camera.

When she arrives home he is there. He asks where she was. She says she was riding her bike. He tells her she’s a whore.

That night he is still bitching at her about the box and her laziness when she opens a can of Chef Boyardee ravioli for dinner. He says she is a dumb lazy stupid fat cunt bitch. He asks her why the roast is not ready for dinner and she tells him that tonight she is too stupid fat lazy and dumb to make him dinner. He says she is all those things every night. “Fucking bitch,” he spits. The ravioli swells in her stomach and she feels ill.

She gets ready for bed and from the bathroom she can hear him telling the dogs that their mother is a stupid bitch. She thinks, yes, I am.