The End of Things - Ariana Speyer

When she spit out the food I made her, I’d say that was the end of things. I even knew it at the time. I made a cinnamon roll and by accident used too much salt, and she spit it out, as if I had been trying to poison her. Then she looked at me quietly, as if I had done it on purpose. Then I tasted it, but I didn’t want to spit it out, like she did, so I swallowed it, almost choking as I did, but I got it down.

“You used salt instead of sugar, Arnie,” she told me. “Why can’t you pay attention?”

Susanne had asked me why I couldn’t pay attention before, many times. I guess it was a pattern. Why couldn’t I pay attention when I tramped wet shoes in the house? Why couldn’t I pay attention when I dried the laundry and everything came out a little smaller? Why couldn’t I pay attention when I had an orgasm before she did? I never knew the answers to those questions, I just felt like I was human and, that being the case, I was going to make some mistakes, fuck up now and then. Doesn’t everyone?

Susanne certainly did. She even cheated on me. I was a little older than her, well more than a little, 15 years, so I thought she had some wild oats to sow. I thought I was okay with that. But I wasn’t. His name was Dan, he drove a truck and had sideburns. Dan burned a hole through us that I tried to patch with kindness. I wouldn’t do that again. I don’t feel kind anymore. Dan pushed us toward the ledge and then for a year, or two, we were just waiting for the next thing to push us over, toward the bottom. We even had good times that year. Went on a trip to the Caribbean and everything. Had good sex. Maybe because we both knew. So the cinnamon roll came as only a slight surprise.

When she spit out the food I made for her, I had a sense of, I’ll never kiss that mouth again, that mouth that spits out my food. I’ll never want to hold her. That was the end of things. It just snuck up on me one Saturday afternoon and I took a few bags and went away on Monday.