Honey Daiquiri
You know in movies when they’ve been caring for someone who’s terminally ill and it gets really hard and so when the person dies they kind of feel relieved? … That’s how I feel #marriage…
by Miniq Brown
Honey’s House Husband
‘I got a job!’ Whit says as he clambers through the door to find me in the kitchen/dining/living room- our place is really small.
‘Omigosh noway!’ I gasp, lowering the lid on my laptop screen and turning to face him as he crosses the room to me in two steps- told you, really small.
‘It’s this charity. They’re this sort of resource centre. They need someone to lead everything when it comes to design. They’re making me head of design, I get to make all the decisions, it’s awesome!’
‘I’m sorry, let me just get down on my knees and pray! Thank you God!’ I jump up and down holding onto Whit’s arms and kick my legs out sideways in a Charleston skip.
‘The salary isn’t amazing, but it’s better than we were on before.’
‘Plus,’ I sing.
‘Only thing is, it’s based in Reading.’
I immediately stop doing my happy dance. My face pulls serious. ‘What do you mean Reading?’
‘As in Reading.’
‘As in hours away on a train Reading?’ I raise my eyebrow. Whit nods. ‘You mean north of London so I don’t know where it is, Reading?’
‘It’s kind of… West.’
‘Whit!’ I drop his arms. ‘This sucks. You can’t work in Reading, I hardly see you as it is. I’m alone all day, just me and that stupid cat-’
‘You love that cat.’
‘Let’s just say if she suddenly died of a heart attack I wouldn’t miss being elbow-deep in her litter box.’
‘Don’t say that she can hear you.’
‘I’m pretty sure she is currently planning my murder.’
We both look at that cat.
‘I’m watching you,’ I mouth, as Whit turns me back to face him. ‘You can’t work in Reading Whit. I’ve just finished my hand-ins, there is nothing left to stop me from going completely crazy. Apart from writing my stupid novel, which I can’t start yet because, let’s face it, I’m not talented, and if and when I do I am basically giving people permission to look into my soul, and once they start looking they won’t stop until they discover, guess what, I’m completely crazy!’ My husband shakes me, once, hard. ‘Thank you. You can’t go to Reading Whit.’
‘I’m not.’
‘But we need this job. Working at the cafe is so not cutting it-’
‘I took the job.’
‘Okay… I’m lost.’
‘I’m working from home.’
‘Wait, what?’
‘The position means I get to work from home! I’m gonna be home, with you.’
I look at Whit steadily, ‘Like, every day?’ He nods happily. ‘Like all day… with me… here?’ Whit grins and hugs me, nearly lifting me off the ground. My arms are straight as planks, my eyes wide as saucers.
Roadsidepictures / is licensed by CC by 2.0.
*
‘What was I supposed to say to him? Turn down the position, immediately, I don’t want to spend that much time with you?’ I plea to Kara and Bugsy on the balcony to Kara’s flat while she finishes changing the baby and Bugsy tries to look cool, hanging his arms off the side, staring out into the distance, all Blue Steel- No I’m totally kidding, he has one hand tucked in his tracksuit bottoms and the other plays piano tiles on his phone, high score 18,000, I mean, come on! ‘He was so excited and I had just finished saying that we don’t see each other enough, when all I wanted to tell him was that spending all day with him home on the weekend was pushing it.’
‘Why lie then,’ Bug pipes up, eyes not leaving the screen for a second. ‘If you feel like you spend enough time with him, why tell him that you don’t?’
‘I do feel like I don’t spend enough time with him.’
‘Then good for you, now you will,’ Bug smiles his wide, fake, grin.
‘I think what she means is,’ Kara assists, ‘when someone is always working, even when you see them it’s not like you’re seeing them.’
‘Exactly, why should I sit at home and get to smell his farts all day and pick up after him when he is literally getting paid to ignore me,’ I finish. Kara nods, closing her eyes in an ‘Amen’.
‘Women,’ Bug breathes, and Kara and I raise simultaneous eyebrows at him. He glances up in time to catch our glare and double-takes, immediately dying on his game.
‘Care to rephrase?’ I suggest.
‘I’m just saying, we don’t know what you want. “Spend more time with me” “Oh no, not you again”- make up your mind!’
‘You act like they’re two different minds!’ I proclaim as Kara hands me the chubby nine-month-old. ‘I want him to spend more time with me, not in the house on his laptop making a mess for me to clear up. It’s bad enough for him not to appreciate me when he’s gone twelve hours a day, it’s worse when he does it to my face, not realising that his very presence creates more work for me with the expectation that I be grateful for his very presence?! I want him to spend time taking me somewhere beautiful, doting on me, feeding me for a change, not sitting in his boxers, showerless, while complaining about needing the next upgrade for Creative Suite!’
Kara giggles as I make a face at the baby and Bugsy looks at me skeptically.
‘So you want to go out?’
‘God no, we can’t afford that. And go where? London sucks.’
Bugsy pinches his nosebridge and laughs. ‘This. Is Why. I’m Single.’
‘Oh really, is that why?’ Kara asks coyly.
‘That, and all the good ones are taken,’ he smirks.
‘Not all of them.’
‘You know a couple?’
‘One or two…’
I’m breathing, but all I can smell are pheromones. ‘Should I give you two the room?’
‘If you could introduce me, I could make it work,’ Bug continues as if I haven’t spoken.
‘Um, I think you already know one. You may have met at a wedding…?’ Kara flirts. Bugsy full on grins. I swear, if she bites her lip right now I’ll be in the middle of a Disney-Pixar #thinlyveiledsexualinnuendo.
‘Okay, I’m gonna take the baby for a walk, you two do what you do.’ I rise to my feet.
‘What?’ they both reply.
stephanie vacher / is licensed by CC by 2.0.
‘Um hm,’ I answer. Just date already.
*
‘Hi Honey!’ Mom’s voice rings down the phone as I round the corner to her road, adjusting my knickers that were bus-askew.
‘Hi mom, I’m right around the corner.’
‘Oh good,’ she says with an audible smile. ‘Then you can ride with me in the ambulance.’
‘Huh?!’
I race down my parents’ road, underwear climbing ever higher, and see the ambulance parked in the driveway. Mom is being loaded into the back, EMTs take her vitals, but she waves like I’ve come to pick her up from playgroup when she sees me.
‘What the hell is going on?’
‘Oh, I may have forgotten to tell you that the doctors found something abnormal during my first scan that they said would affect the baby, and said that if I continue with the pregnancy rather than undergo immediate treatment my life might be in danger.’
‘But don’t worry, I’m sure everything is fine.’
‘No, totally,’ I respond, my voice barely a croak. ‘Ambulances pick me up all the time, much more convenient than buses.’
‘We need to take your mom to St. Georges, she’s in critical condition.’
‘Honestly dear,’ Mom takes the EMT’s arm, ‘I feel fine.’
‘Are you coming?’ the EMT asks me. I jump into the back of the ambulance and my underwear takes the final dive up crack creek. I try to ignore the discomfort and focus on Mom’s milky eyes.
‘Who else have you called?’ I ask as the EMT stashes mom’s phone to the side and the other one climbs in the front of the ambulance.
‘Just you.’
‘Dad?’
‘No need to bother him, he’s with a client.’
‘You heard the girl say critical condition right?’
The EMT straps a monitor to Mom’s belly and both of us look up at the same time her face drops with focus.
‘Is the baby…’ Mom trails.
The EMT looks up at us, face solemn. ‘Can’t confirm anything until we get to the hospital, their machines are more accurate than ours.’
Mom flops back, losing consciousness as blood starts to stream down her leg. The EMT dives on her. I slide out of the way.
EMT: ‘She might be haemorrhaging.
Me: Frozen in shock.
My mom is losing her baby. She could be dying. And I have the biggest wedgie right now…
*
That’s all folks!
See you for season 2 of Honey Daiquiri after the summer break! In the meantime, follow us and look us up on Twitter: @MiniqBrown @BracketRocket.
Also- Daffy vs. Donald? Why is that not an Epic Rap Battle yet?
*
