Chapter 1

Maida returned home and lay her bag on the floor next to the glass coffee table. The room stood silent in the absense of Lammond. Maida strided into the kitchen to begin making dinner. She started by preparing the meat. This had been the third time this week that Lammond had been late home from work. In the past month Lammond had often been leaving for work early, and on other days he had been returning home from work late. Some days he would leave for work early and return home late on the same day.

After preparing the meat, Maida slid the meat into the oven and began preparing the vegetables. Lammond had been increasingly away from home in the name of work more in the last 3 months. He didn't provide reasons, he just said that it was work. Yet he didn't do this much before 3 months ago. This habit had built incrementally.

Maida had the vegetables ready and threw them in the pan to boil. She left the kitchen and slumped on the sofa in the living room. She turned the television on with the remote control. The news was on television. Maida sighed and wondered what Lammond could be doing and when he would return. There's nothing she could do about it now with dinner cooking. She could only wait and speculate about what time Lammond would come home.

She went into the kitchen and made a coffee for herself, then returned to the living room and stood at the wall sized window. She looked out onto the rainy wet city from her high rise apartment. The thunder in the distance sounded so loud that it didn't seem so far away. Looking outside, coffee in hand, Maida thought about her marriage. She remembered 5 years ago, the happy day she got married, then 4 years ago when she and Lammond moved into the apartment. She remembered the new home scent of wood and clean windows when they moved in. She also thought about the past few months. Her job had been the image of consistency, she went to work, worked, and came home. In her line of work, there was never a need for overtime. Lammonds work, though also seldom requiring overtime, seemed to be frought with heavy workloads and long hours in recent months. That is according to Lammond. Yet his briefcase always looked the same every day, as if he didn't have any more work than usual. Why the long hours? As Maida was speculating the answer to this question, Lammond enters.

Lammond said, "Sorry I'm late. I had work again". Sliding his shoes off, he said, "What's cooking?". "Oh, the usual", answered Maida in nonchalance. Lammond threw himself on the sofa and yawned. Like a chore he asked, "How has your day been?". "Fine", said Maida abruptly. Lammond watched the television, the weather forecast was now on. He picked up the remote control and changed the channel. Maida swivelled around, walked to the sofa and with the remaining coffee in hand said to Lammond, "We should talk". Sprawled across half of the sofa he groaned. He complained, "Not now.  I want to watch this". An action drama was showing on the television. Maida reminded him, "Dinner will be ready soon" and then proceeded to the kitchen.

She readied the dinner in the kitchen and took it into the dining room. She laid dinner out in the dining room on the dining table. She called Lammond into the dining room for dinner. He slouched into the dining room and the couple both sat at their usual places. Lammond complained, "I don't see why we can't have dinner in the living room!". Annoyed, Maida answered, "Because it will ruin the furniture....and the floor! I don't want food on my floor!". Grumpily Lammond replied, "So we have to eat it in here....". There was a long pause. Maida then approached, "There's something I want to talk to you about". Lammond whined, "What about me?!? What about what I want?!". Maida said, "You have what you want. A job, an apartment....marriage". There was an expectant silence. The beauty of the marriage seemed to have escaped and had been replaced by an air of tedious repetitive regimented boredom and clockwork scheduling.