The Stillness of Four Walls

Sun in an Empty Room — Edward Hopper

He picked the packet of peanuts up and smacked his lips as he cut it open and heard each one clink onto the pan. He placed the pan over the stove and sat on the counter, waiting for the smell to engulf the kitchen as Mama walked in with a grocery bag and Papa followed right behind saying “Where have you been?”

Mama shook the bag in Papa’s face and placed it on the counter, grinning coyly.

“I called twice.”

“Really? Guess my phone was on silent.”

“Who were you with?”

“No one.”

“Give me your phone.”

“Why?”

“I want to check something.”

“You can just ask me.”

“You’ll just lie. Give it to me now.”

“Not going to happen.”

Mama looked at her son and said “Baby, you’re going to burn it, keep the flame low and don’t forget to stir.”

The son nodded as he stared at the brown turning darker and the thin wisps of vapour, his legs swinging gently in the aroma already wafting through the room, he took a spatula and stirred as Papa reached briskly into Mama’s pocket and slipped the phone out.

Mama shouted in protest and reached for it, Papa shouted back “What are you hiding?” as he stood scowling at the screen, Mama began to whimper “Why don’t you trust me?”

“You know why.”

“What did I ever do? Tell me, what did I…”

Papa flashed the phone at her “Who’s this?”

“It’s…the grocer, you idiot.”

“Don’t call me an idiot, woman. I know you’re up to something.”

“I’m not…I’ve never been up to anything. You’re just an insecure…”

The son took the pan off the stove and began to peel the nuts one handful after the other.

“…No, no, you’re not fooling me again. I see your eyes when we’re out, I see you looking….and it’s never at me.”

“And you? You’re a saint, are you? I see the lechery in your face. Don’t give me that shit.”

“You aren’t even denying it. I knew it. I just knew it.”

“Knew what? I’ve been right here every day for two damn decades putting up with you and for what? For this? This incessant suspicion, this delicate ego of yours I have to keep massaging?”

“My ego? All you do is beat me down, all you do is slam my heart with how little you care, how little you want me.”

The peanut skins danced like whirligigs from a tree as they fell to the floor, he ran them through a sieve and dropped the first batch of nuts into the mixer.

“You don’t even TOUCH me unless you want to…”

He turned the knob with a hand over the lid and the blaring whir began. It sounded like silence for it drowned out their yawping but, in spite of it and because of it, their voices grew louder.

“WHEN WAS THE LAST TIME WE EVEN FUCKED, WOMAN?”

“I’D RATHER DIE, MY SKIN CRAWLS WHEN YOU GET UNDER THE SHEETS!”

“EVERYTHING I’VE GIVEN YOU, ALL THAT I’VE DONE, ALL THE SACRIFICES, AND ALL I GET IS AN UNGRATEFUL CUNT!”

“YOU’RE MY CURSE, YOU’VE GIVEN ME NOTHING BUT MISERY AND MISERY! GOD, I HATE YOUR FACE, I HATE THE WAY YOU SMELL, I HATE THE SOUND OF YOUR VOICE!”

“SOME DAYS I WAKE UP AND I THINK HOW EASY, HOW EASY IT WOULD BE IF YOU JUST DIED!”

The son felt the heat of the machine rise up to the lid, but he didn’t stop it. Not to stir, not to check its progress, he just kept it going with his gaze on a single square of the wall.

Mama’s voice suddenly drew inwards, she gulped with a tear running down her cheek and said, as softly as she could, “I’ve thought about poisoning you every single day, if only there was a way without jail, without hurting the boy… if there was a way, believe me, I’d have done it.”

The son had a knot in his chest all the while that tightened like a vice with each word they spoke, though he was not thinking a single thought and his feeling was buried deep beneath his resignation, it shot forth all at once like vomit and compelled his hand off the lid.

Chunks of peanut butter flew to the walls the cabinets the clothes the face Papa’s arm Mama’s hair as his other hand made a fist and punched down into the mixer’s blades slicing through the knuckles the fingers the skin of the palm with a sickening crunch of blade on flesh blade on bone blade on blood and blood as the son opened his mouth and screamed.

They stared at him, frightened and frozen.

Mama rushed to the mixer as blood splattered her eye and turned it off, she pulled his arm out and shivered as she shouted “GOD OH GOD, WHAT HAVE YOU DONE, BABY? WHY DID YOU DO THAT? OH GOD, WHY DID YOU DO THAT?”

Papa ran to him and wrapped four towels over the bloody buttered nub, he searched the counter for a stray finger and found only three. He picked them up and put them on ice, then the family ran out into the car and onto the road as fast as they could.

The son looked at Papa’s face fixed ahead and Mama’s face beside him and saw no loathing, this loosened the knot in his chest enough to rest his head on her shoulder and release a deep and easy sigh.

She patted his head and stared out the window at the space between the street and the sky as her insides suffocated and, beneath her breath, she prayed.