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Lying in bed last night, cocooned in that sweet hypnagogic haze, drifting, dissolving into sleepy dust, I was suddenly disturbed by my loving, placid neighbors. With closed eyes, with my head osmosing with the pillow, my body osmosing with the blanket and bed, I listened to their incongruous fight. This is what I remember:

Mr. & Mrs. Smith. Court One. Warm up. After twenty-two years it is exorable that my love for you has faded. I never loved you in the first place. I married you for the money. I married you because I was forced into it. Practice serves.  I have been using your razor on my legs for years. I always pour the last dregs of your almond/coconut fancy milk down the drain. I hide that one sock, the one that goes missing after a wash, and if you look in the cupboard in the spare room you will find them, all of them, years and years. I do the same with your car keys, you are not crazy. Even though I accuse you and berate you and call you all the names under the sun for having left toast crumbs in the butter yes it was me. You are Snow White in the bedroom. You are Rumpelstiltskin in the bedroom. Vagina dentata! Memento mori! Stretch. Drink liquid. Eat a banana. Meet at the net. Shake hands. Serve. It was I that broke your mother’s heirloom not the dog. Net. Second Serve. I leave the toilet seat up with the hope that during the night you will fall into the toilet. Fifteen Love. Serve. The last two times we had sex I faked the orgasm waited until you passed out and then used your fingers for a dildo. Fifteen Fifteen. Serve. Bitch! Line Call. Second Serve. Serve. I got so high on drugs at your father’s cremation I thought it is was disco. Out. Line call. Fifteen Thirty. Serve. Those inexplicable holes in your expensive clothing is not the consequence of hungry moths it is my artwork with scissors. Thirty Thirty. Serve. I might have used your toothbrush before bed before work on the soles of my feet for years. Thirty Forty. Break Point. Serve. What. Out. Second Serve. Serve.  Remember Malta. Remember Gozo. You remember those hot sultry nights.  Remember the meal at that sea food place in Valletta. Remember we had to take you back to the apartment. You said you were not feeling right; you blamed the oysters. Well, while you slept, your brother and I walked along the beach. It was on that beach, to the sound of waves crashing, under the moon, under the stars, we made love. And Gozo. Remember Gozo.  Remember Calypso’s cave. We left you sunbathing on Ramla Bay. We said we wanted to visit Odyssey’s Prison. So, we climbed up the hill to the cave. We waved. You returned the wave. In Calypso’s Cave, I sucked him off. Then he sucked me off. And then all together we swam in the sea, under the hot sun. It was extremely romantic! Deuce. Serve. Romantic my ass! It was never a secret. Daniel confessed. He said he hated you and that you were too much, always nagging him, always pestering him like an old pervert. He said that you were all over him like an old grandmother. He gave in just to make you stop. He said you got him drunk on cheap nasty wine. cheap nasty wine! Said you had no taste. He even told me about the drugs. Ad Out. Serve.  I killed the dog. The tennis ball was not a mistake. I stuffed the tennis down its throat. I did it. I confess. I couldn’t take the constant yapping. Deuce. Serve. I have been having an affair with Tim, your boss. We meet Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. At that motel on 5^th Street. Yes, he has a bigger penis than you.  He makes me come repeatedly. I even allow him to anal fuck me, which I now enjoy. We are talking about going to swingers’ clubs and parties. And he says by the way you are fired! Ad Out. Serve. I thought about hiring a gun man to take you out. Net. Second Serve. Serve. I have been for the last three months poisoning you with small amounts of rat poison. Game. Set. Match. Mrs. Smith wins.

Paul Kavanagh