What Plan? - Chris Callaghan

Lately Jeff was always telling Rosie how disorganized she was.

Her fiancé: Mr. Anal, Mr. Bureaucrat couldn’t even go to the grocery store without meticulous planning. She could have handled a list, but mapping out which aisles to go down in advance was a new level of obsessive-ness. God forbid something got put in the cart that wasn’t on the list. Sometimes she’d tuck bizarre things in there just to get a reaction out of him. Things like: baby pacifiers, a jar of pickled oysters, hemorrhoid pads, or Fixodent.

Five years ago they would have laughed at her choices but not now. He seemed to be clenching into himself more intensely lately, and she seemed to be purposely flinging herself into bedlam.

It’s true they’d always been an odd couple, being complete opposites, but there was an interesting symmetrical balance that made it work. She loosened his tension and ties, and he gave her a comforting stability to rely on and turn to. It was surprising even to them how well their relationship worked.

Today they’d hit a new low, perpetrated either by the global crises or the full moon. They’d both said unrecoverable words before he’d stalked out the front door to go to the mortgage seminar he’d signed them both up for, and she’d flung the surprise picnic she’d planned into the basket of her bike and pedaled it furiously down to the park.

Rosie intentionally spread her blanket in the direct sun, knowing the exact words Jeff would have to say about the dangers of UV exposure. Well, she wasn’t listening today – she was sick and tired of his lists and charts and damn reasoning. She tried to eat, but was still so upset, she could only manage half a chicken leg. She defiantly popped open the wine and drank almost 2 glasses before falling asleep on her stomach.

She woke up to some man’s hand on her shoulder and panicked. She thrashed over onto her back screaming for Jeff. Rosie almost smacked him in the face before she realized it was him.

“Why aren’t you at the seminar?” she gasped.

He was kneeling in the damp grass in his white khakis. “Oh honey,” he said softly. “You’re bright red.”

She pointed to his knees, “You know that stain will never come out.” They looked at each other for a full minute, and then he pulled her to her knees and they both stood. Jeff picked up the picnic stuff and moved everything over to the shade of the big tree behind them. He flipped the blanket out and down, not even smoothing out the wrinkles.

“Any lunch left?” He asked.

“Yeah, but it’s been in the sun,” she said.

“That’s one of the best thermal coolers money can buy.” He smiled.

Two women were sitting on a bench a few trees over. One said, “Look how different they are.” And the other said, “That pair will never last.”

Little did they know.