I suppose that my only excuse for this is that I've read too many Loving Wives stories. Parts of this are true, although it was a friend who taught my fiancé the lesson. While my wife sometimes threatens me with it when she is annoyed, she has never actually done it.
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I was lying on our living room floor, dazed and rubbing my jaw. My wife was kneeling next to me, alternately begging me to be okay and yelling at me for being such a jerk. I guess that's the price you pay for being both a husband and a fool at the same time.
Let me go back to about two minutes earlier. It was a Friday evening and I'd worked late again. I was doing a lot of that these days, but I was working to get ahead and I thought she understood. My wife and I had been talking about starting a family soon, and if she quit her job there would be just the one income. I needed to do my best to stay employed and get ahead. I came home exhausted every night, but I came home. I was sober. I didn't stop off for a drink or worse. I just worked late. That's all I did.
Walking through the door, I couldn't help but reflect on my wife and my life of late. She'd been distant and withdrawn. She seemed distracted, but then I suppose she might have said the same about me. Our sex life had dropped off in recent months as well. Maybe that's normal for a couple four years into marriage? I had noticed, but I'd been too tired to say anything.
Like I said, I came through the door and my wife was sitting in the living room. I hadn't even had time to put down my briefcase and she says, "Honey, we need to talk."
My blood ran cold. I thought to myself, "Oh, fuck, not that! Not the 'We need to talk' talk! Four years of marriage and all those years before when it was her and only her, and now 'We need to talk'?!"
"No! No, damn it, no! You can't! I won't! If you want someone else, then just pack your damn bags and leave! I won't sit at home waiting for you to come home from your dates. I won't share you. I won't be your damn cuck! If you want someone else, then get your ass out!"
That's when she hit me.
I never should have taught her how to throw a punch. By the time I saw it coming it was too late. She caught me on the left side of my jaw. She's just a little thing, really, but I went down for the count and I hit the floor hard. By the time I got my wits about me she was holding my head in her lap, gently rubbing the side of my head, and crying her eyes out. "Baby, baby, are you okay? Oh please, God, let him be okay!"
"Uh, ah hah, I think I'm okay."
She jumped up and dropped my head on the floor again. Oh, that hurt!
"You jerk! Stand up and I'll hit you again!" No sooner did she say it, but she was back on her knees, crying, "Are you sure you're okay, baby? I'm so sorry. Please forgive me."
My head was spinning, and I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. I think I married a schizoid. One minute she's knocking me out and the next she's crying over me.
"I'm okay, sweetie, just please don't hit me again."
She just knelt beside me, holding my head and bawling her eyes out.
As I lay there, my mind went back to the night I taught her how to throw a punch. We were both still in school and I was having dinner with her parents for the first time. I was trying to make a good impression and I thought I was doing pretty well. Oh, who's kidding, they were interrogating me, but they did it with a smile, and I was trying to pass inspection. Her mother had asked me something about my old girlfriends. She does that sort of thing. She loves to catch someone off guard and see how they handle it. I told the truth and made a flippant remark about how I had a history of dating psychos. That's when I felt the jab in my left arm. I looked over and Elizabeth was holding her fist in front of me. Well, if you can call it a fist... Like many girls, she had her thumb inside her fingers. If she hit someone hard like that, she'd dislocate her thumb and cause herself more pain than she inflicted on her attacker.
I was trying not to laugh. "What are you doing?" I sang it in that way young men speak to women when they are trying not to be condescending.
She looked embarrassed. "I punched you."
"No, you didn't. Didn't your brother ever teach you how to throw a punch?"
"No?" It was as much a question as a statement.
"Look..." I took her hand in mine. It was a good excuse to hold her for just a moment. "Open your hand. Now, fold your fingers." As I said it, I held her thumb back. "Make them tight. Now, fold your thumb over your fingers... Not like that... Closer to the fingertips. Lock the fingers in with your thumb. Okay. Now, make the back of your hand straight with your forearm." As I said that, I ran my hand along the back of hers and part way up her arm. She has a lovely arm. Like I said, I was enjoying the excuse. "Just like that. Now, this time hit my hand with these knuckles." With that, I ran my fingers across the knuckles closest to her wrist.
