Coffee for One

Mrs. Reynolds wakes to the sun and a pale arm locked around her neck. The bed is warm where her skinny body has lain throughout the night; warm also from the inquisitive light that streams through the window. But it is gradually dawning upon her that the arm around her neck is not very warm at all.

At first she does not twitch a muscle. Only her eyes swivel downwards to note the fine hairs intersecting pallid liver spots. The skin has a faint purple sheen that reminds her, for a split, ludicrous moment, of the baby hydrangeas in the front garden. The sun rifles through his hair to illuminate the curious motes of dust that tentatively hover, dancing, watching her being afraid. She twists to look – squirms – rebels in the strangulating grip of the persistent arm. “Wake up,” she says. “Wake up, Bill.”

Bill does not wake. His form is slowly stiffening on the bed and his eyes are half-open staring angrily at the ceiling and his arm is flung sideways in a last attempt around the neck of his wife, but he does not wake. He is dead, she thinks, as the timid sunlight grows in strength and confidence, suffusing into her supine limbs, urging her heartbeat to quicken. Is he dead?

Slowly, she extricates herself from the bed, from that awful arm, and plants her feet upright onto the carpet. When she stands, it is with a delicate deliberation. She does not look behind her as she moves through the empty house into the kitchen. Her body has begun to recite the familiar motions. Yet a part of her mind, long felt dead, observes that these are only temporary measures: the washing of the hands at the kitchen sink; the rise and fall of the spoon over-heaped with dark brown dust; the frenetic hum of the filter machine that for twenty-seven years has made coffee for two.

For two. No. For one, today. Her pursed and noiseless lips: they come undone, turn faintly slack. Twenty-seven years, she’s placed two cups side by side on the kitchen table in the morning. But now she reaches up in the sunlight to the cabinet, and retrieves a single mug. It is a silly mug, shaped like a flat-based giant egg, with a jagged rim to drink from. Entirely impractical. She realised as much when she came home and unpacked it from its box, setting it on the counter along with all the other mundane things – cabbages, toilet rolls, Bill’s favourite brand of cigarettes. She was in such a cheerful mood. In general, she never bought a trivial thing.

Bill came into the room then, she remembers. He said nothing; only raised an eyebrow and looked at her in that stiff and heavy way. Then her cheeks burned, she coughed, she put it right in the back of the cabinet. How self-indulgent, she raged – against herself, it seemed.

She watches the dark liquid churn and cascade into the carafe where it settles into clear, perfect stillness. What else must change, she wonders? Dinners, for one. Perhaps now she can have omelette. Bill did not like omelette. It is possible that he did not like eggs as a rule, come to think of it. Bedtime, too. His grizzled head will no longer heave; his limbs no longer roll and trample on her silent, flaccid body.

She sips her coffee. She thinks of all these things, and then of waking up this morning with a dead man in her bed. She catches a glimpse of herself in the black glass of the kitchen cabinet window. The ridge-lined pattern of the glass distorts her reflection for the most part, cutting up her face. From what she can see, her hair is frizzy, and her chintz nightgown edged with tiny yellow flowers is frumpled and shambolic. There will have to be a wake, she makes a mental note. Her reflection nods in solemn affirmation.

She laughs! The sound is oddly natural, feminine and easy, spilling into the room like fresh-brewed coffee into an egg-shaped mug; like an old lady in her pajamas jumping from her hiding place to yell SURPRISE. How ridiculous. How ridiculous.

She leaves her mug on the table and walks through the papered corridor into the bedroom. Almost to her surprise, her husband has not moved from his position on the bed. What’s the matter, Bill? She caws in her head. You seem a little blue.

Bill does not reply. She looks at his naked form: shrivelled nipples, forlorn penis, hands that seem almost as though they had flexed into despairing claws. As quickly as her good cheer comes it dissipates. She is ashamed.

The sun is blazing through the bay window now, harsh and eager, pressing against her skin. It pierces through the thin fabric of her gown. She feels she must escape it or be destroyed. Raising the covers, she crawls into bed with the corpse. Its arm is still crooked. Awkwardly, she rests her head in its embrace. The cold clammy flesh forms a sheltering respite from the madding sun.

“Bill,” whispers Mrs. Reynolds. “Bill, I’m ever so sorry.”