Edmund unlocked the front door just after 9:30 and dragged himself in. He stood for a moment at the landing just inside the front door, stairs down to basement to his right and up to the main house to the left.
They’d intended to replace this fake wood paneling. Could’ve afforded it this summer, but…occupied with other things. Maybe once they got to better times.
He trudged slowly up the stairs.
From the kitchen, he heard Jennifer: “Edmund, we need to talk.”
He paused with his foot just above the next to last step up.
“Babe, I’ve been at Best Buy since 8 AM. I just want to sit down and get something resembling supper. Can it wait?”
He took the last few steps up and turned the corner into their kitchen. She sat at the kitchen table looking at him. The room was dim, the only light coming from the single bulb above the sink.
“No, it really can’t.”
He stood there looking at her a moment, then turned and opened the fridge, pulling out some ham, some “cheese” slices, and mustard.
“Okay, let’s talk.”
He grabbed the bread from the counter and sat down at the table.
“Ed, this isn’t working anymore.”
He set two slices of bread out on the table.
“What, is the dishwasher not draining again? I can get in there tom—“
“Not the dishwasher, Ed. Us. This isn’t working.”
Edmund’s hand paused in midair with the cheese he was putting on the bread. It took his brain a moment to shift gears.
He snapped his head up to stare at her, “Jenn, what are you—“
“Edmund, I think we need to—“
“No. No. Nononono!”
“We need to—“
“Don’t say it.”
“I think we should divorce.”
Edmund looked at her in silence a few seconds. He looked down at his half-made sandwich the a few seconds more.
“You went and said it.”
This wasn’t a complete shock. Edmund was not an idiot, and only an idiot hears those words as a complete surprise. It had been a bad year…a very bad year. The trial and verdict, his firing and unemployment, and…that day. Jennifer had had to go full time with her massage therapy job, and money was still tight.
But he’d hoped they wouldn’t get to this.
He said, “There’s some things you can’t unsay, honey. Believe me. I know.”
“This isn’t the life we were supposed to have.”
“No! No, it’s not! But life takes things from you sometimes. That doesn’t mean you smash the things you still have!”
“Where are we headed, Edmund?”
“Look, I know it’s rough right now, but Mark said in another four or five months, he can probably get me a job at—“
“It isn’t just about the money, Ed!”
Jennifer stood up and walked to the sink, looking out through the blinds towards the dark street.
“Then. What. Is it about?”
She said something so quietly and hurriedly that he couldn’t make it out.
“What?”
“Jessica thinks you’re a racist.”
Edmund gripped the edge of the table so hard his fingers hurt.
Quietly at first, but growing to a shout: “Tell me, did your self-righteous blue-haired twit of a sister hold our son as he bled to death in the street? Because I did!”
“Don’t talk about my sister that way!”
Edmund stood up himself now, but had gotten his voice under control again.
“Did you say that to her? Did you even try to defend me? Defend us?”
Cassie peeked around the corner from the hallway. “Mom? Dad? What’s going on?”
They both turned to look at her.
Edmund spoke first, “It’s okay, munchkin. Go back to bed. You have school tomorrow.”
Jennifer walked past him and put her arm around Cassie’s shoulder to walk her back to her room.
Edmund knew it was futile. He had heard it in her voice. He saw it in the set of her shoulders. But still, as she walked away, he called after her: “Jenn, this isn’t going to get you what you want. This won’t take you where you want to go.”
He stood there watching the empty hallway for a minute, then turned back and put away the lunchmeat and cheese. He tossed his half-made sandwich in the trash.
He slept on the couch that night, and got up the next morning to be back at Best Buy by 7:30.
The Mayor of Christ Mountain 
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