The park is crowded with couples, families, and people walking their dogs. A husband is searching for his wife. He finds her sitting on a bench. He sits down beside her with a crooked smile. She is staring into the air.
Husband: “You left. Why did you leave?”
Wife: “I just could not stay. All those people.”
Husband: “(chuckles)It is your birthday, your party. Why did you leave?”
Her eye catches a couple having a picnic.
Wife: “Have you noticed that almost everyone is here with someone? Look at that happy couple over there. They are so young and in love. Can you remember the last time we looked at each other like that?”
Husband: “I hate to say it, but there is a difference between being married for twenty-some-odd years and being on your third date.”
Wife: “Twenty-three.”
Husband: “What?”
Wife: “We have been married for twenty-three years. Maybe that is twenty-three years too many.”
Husband: “What are you saying? We love each other.”
Wife: “Do we? Do we really? You are always working, and I…”
Husband: “Why did you leave?”
Wife: “Because there was no point. I have been having an affair.”
Husband: “What? An affair? And you are telling me this now? On a bench in the park?”
Wife: “We should get a divorce. However you want to handle it, whatever you want to do is fine with me.”
Husband: “Just like that? Our marriage is over? What I think or feel does not matter?”
Wife: “No.”
She leaves him sitting on the bench alone.
Is this a dramatist as author function?
ReplyDeleteThe wife is an interesting tough character, probably concealing a lot under her exterior brusqueness - she could be the girl from Hills Like White Elephants, 23 years down the road...
I was trying to go with dramatist as the author function. It was hard to write so little. That was really a struggle.
ReplyDeleteI'm glad it was a struggle! Good job.
ReplyDelete