Pork Chops

Although he couldn’t save his wife, Matthew said he was lucky to escape the woods. Later, it came out that, on the first day of the hike, he hit her on the head with a stone and pushed her off a cliff. Apparently, it was planned all along. Her body struck the rock wall twice, then crashed through the canopy of trees below. Some of her short mousey hairs stuck to the stone, which he chucked after her. He timed twenty minutes on his watch then called for help. No one came. Even so, he kicked loose pieces of dirt from the edge of the trail, so it would appear, if anyone looked, that he’d tried to scramble down after her.

Uncle Dan asked why he’d wanted to murder his wife and Matthew shook his head and said he wasn’t sure; it seemed for the best. He’d not loved her anymore. There’d been something about how she ate pork chops, nibbling deliberately round the bone, her teeth snipping together with little clicks. When they’d first met, it was something cute he’d noticed, but soon…just the way she’d keep going until each bone was stripped. It got at him, until he could barely stand to be in the same room when she ate.

“You killed her because of how she’d clean a bone,” Aunt Babs asked. She laughed, clicking her own teeth.

“No”, said Matthew. “Not just that, that’s one thing. One of a million little things that all add up. You must know?”

He looked between us all, hoping to find one understanding face. He’d had the same desperate look when he burst out of the woods, filthy and hungry, his expensive hiking clothes ripped and bloody, falling to pieces as he walked. As he’d made his way back along the trail, he’d realized the map and compass were in his wife’s knapsack; the water too. Even on well-used trails, it’s easy to go astray.

“Please understand,” he said. Before he rolled her over the edge, he told us about how her jittering heels cut half-moons in the dirt.

“Please.” He said that word a lot. Please give him medicine. Please give him water. Please give him food. Please loosen the shackle. Please unlock the cage. Please, please, please. He’d beg, with tears tracking white lines through the dirt on his face.

He’d whisper it or, sometimes, scream it at the top of his voice. When it got too much, Uncle Hector stamped off his porch to the court house lawn, and hosed him with cold water until he stopped.