Some Sort of Epiphany

When the man came home his wife asked him what was wrong, and he only replied that he did not know.   It wasn't so long ago that he would have compiled a laundry list of grievances to thrust upon her question, but at that moment he was left speechless.  It was accentuated by the sound of the kitchen faucet - that the wife had running for her many dirty dishes.   The water ran into water, and he pictured in his minds eye the suds building into a small bubble bath for the various plates and drinking glasses inside.   The food would loosen and then with the help of a rag in the hand of his frail wife they would be wiped clean.  He thought of all this rather than his irritation that the dog had pissed on the throw rug again.  In truth he could see the stain still their behind his eyes, a wide round yellow stain on the off white shag of that carpet that lay in the center of the living room.  It was a definite eye sore, but he had no defining words to give his irritable feeling.   His mind was at a loss, even for the way his wife stopped shaving her legs one day.  He had felt them brush against his own and voiced that she mine as well have been a man.   The man had not truly meant it, he did not think that his wife's hairy legs made her less of a woman but her refusal to keep her role bothered something guttural in his beliefs. 

She then briefly removed herself from his view, and he rocked - as he had been - in his black chewed on leather chair and he stroked at the stubble on his chin.   When once he had been so angry at the incessant noise of the neighboring children he was now finding it peaceful their obnoxious laughing and screaming.  He stopped rocking and placed the soles of his feet flatly on the wooden floor and he kept his fingers on his stubble.  "What are you making for dinner?"  He hollered to the next room.  Perhaps this newfound respect for the things he found disrespectful could be quenched with a taste of a good home cooked meal.

"I ordered out, chinese.  Hope that's alright."  She responded, their was a simple fear in her voice.  That bothered him, but not in an angry way, it was that gut feeling again, that vomit inducing queasiness.  It was in fact okay that they eat take out, it was in fact not a problem.  But he heard in her voice a fear that it would be.  He was hurt.  Had he really been that petty, that picky, that grumpy?   So much so that his wife would be worried he'd retaliate in some way for her choices.  

"That is fine."  He said.