A Comic Love Story
“Did you hide my cufflinks? Where are my cufflinks?”
“You lose your stuff and then accuse me: That’s really low, you know? I’ve never even seen your cufflinks. I didn’t know you had cufflinks.”
“Well, they were right up here, like, a week ago, when I got them out of my junk box … oh, here they are.”
“Jerk.”
“Well, you’re always hiding my things.”
“You mean picking up after you, putting your stuff away, so you don’t live like a pig, you mean?”
“Thank you. I’m not a child, you know?”
“Is my hair too puffy? Rochelle is out with a flu, so Marie did my perm, but it’s too puffy, isn’t it?”
“It’s fine. It looks good.”
“Liar. Come here, hold this mirror in back.”
“I’m shaving.”
“Well, stop shaving. I need your help.”
“I can’t. I’d lose my rhythm.”
“You can’t help your own wife? What a lousy husband you are! What if I was drowning and you were shaving?”
“I’d finish shaving, so I’d look my best on television when I describe the tragedy: ‘She was a good woman, and I miss her so much …’”
“Jerk.”
“’But now I’m FREE!’ Maybe I could hit on that hot blond reporter, Candy Carpenter. Grrrr.”
“Hold that still.”
“Got any breath mints?”
“Why?”
“Why? Do you have any?”
“Those new extra strong ones? Those are good, huh?”
“So?”
“No.”
“Ready to go?”
“I guess.”

“Hello. We’re here for the Birkenbach-Trumpet wedding. What’s going on?”
“They didn’t tell you either? Now I have to take all these flowers back. Think they’ll pay for ‘em? I bet they don’t. Good thing I got a deposit at least. Maybe I can use the same ones for a wedding tomorrow. I got to put ‘em in the fridge fast. Don’t tell.”
“So?”
“Oh, they eloped. Wedding’s off. They told everyone except us, looks like.”
“They eloped? Well, good for them. That’s very romantic.”
“How could they do that to us? Make us get all dressed up, then not show. I don’t get it; it’s rude.”
“It’s romantic. We should have eloped.”
“My folks would have gone berserk.”
“They would have been saved the embarrassment of pretending to like me in public.”
“But what counts is that I liked you.”
“Yeah?”
“And I still do, jerk.”
“Give me some lip then.”
“Give me some squeeze, big guy.”
“See where we are?”
“I do.”
“I do.”
“And you’re taking me out to dinner tonight. Italian.”
“If we get home in fifteen minutes, I can catch the ballgame.”
“I don’t want this hairdo to go to waste.”
“C’mon. Take out pizza.”
“Italian.”

—Story by E. Martin Pedersen
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—Foreground photo by Doriana MariaSneakers Store | Nike Dunk – Collection – Sb-roscoff