Poached Breast
It’s past seven, and when I get home from work, I find Josh at the kitchen table with his earbuds in. He’s eating something that looks like a ball of skin. I nudge his arm, and he takes one earbud out. I hear the distinct voice of Joe Rogan coming out from the tiny speaker.
‘What are you eating?’ I ask.
‘Poached chicken breast.’ He slices a piece off and puts it in his mouth. ‘Protein, protein, protein.’ I gag, fill a pan with water, and put it on the stove.
‘So, your interview went well then?’ I say.
I texted him in the afternoon asking how it went, and he replied with five thumbs up and five grinning faces.
I remain cautious that this is Josh being overly optimistic, like when he was certain he’d got a first-class honours degree, but he got an upper second-class honours degree instead.
And then there was that time he applied to be a geography teacher at Eton.
He was so sure that he’d got the role that he told his whole family, but a few days later, the rejection letter came.
It’s not necessarily a bad trait, but I do take his positivity with a pinch of salt.
‘Yes, very well,’ he says with his usual conviction.
‘How long was it exactly?’
‘Like 20 minutes. Why?’
‘I only had 10 minutes before she asked me to leave,’ I mumble. I reach up to take the box of penne pasta from my shelf.
‘Maybe she already knows you’ve got it,’ Josh says.
I had never thought about it like that. It would make sense why she didn’t seem to be listening to me throughout the interview – I already have it in the bag.
Yes. That’s it. ‘Also,’ Josh continues, ‘I kind of invited Dr Therone to our wedding. Hope that’s okay. ’
I drop the box of pasta, and the tubes scatter all over the floor.
‘Please tell me you’re joking?’ I shriek, but I can already see from his face that he definitely isn’t. ‘Josh, why?’
Josh, for some reason, seems surprised by my reaction.
‘We were talking about it in the interview, and well, I thought it would be a nice thing to do.’ I can’t find the words.
I open the cupboard under the sink with unnecessary force and start unpacking each cleaning bottle, dropping them on the floor with a bang.
Windex, Vanish, Fairy Liquid. BANG, BANG, BANG.
‘If you’re looking for the dustpan and brush, it broke yesterday,’ Josh says. I stop and begin reversing my actions, banging the cleaning products back into the cupboard. ‘Why are you mad?’ he asks.
‘I don’t want her at my wedding, Josh.’ I hiss his name.
‘We won’t even notice she’s there.’
‘She’s the devil in a power suit, of course we’ll know she’s there.’ I sweep the pasta up with my foot until it makes a little penne pile on the tiles.
‘She is our boss. I think it’s only polite. Amy? Please don’t be mad.’ Josh begs. I count to five in my head, then return to the pasta situation, scooping up the penne pile and putting it in the bin. ‘Amy, come on. She probably won’t even come.’
‘Hopefully not,’ I say. I feel suddenly exhausted with Dr Therone. I’m sick of talking about her, I’m sick of thinking about her, so I change the subject to something that makes me happy. ‘Did you see the cottage I sent you today?’ I say, with a calmer tone.
‘Haven’t had time,’ Josh says.
‘You’ll love it. See.’ I come over and put my phone in front of him. ‘It only has two bedrooms, but it has a huge garden to make up for it. Look, you can BBQ just there.’ Josh zooms into the garden.
‘Yeah, it’s huge,’ he says, stating the fact.
‘Maybe we should go view it for fun?’ I push. Josh hands the phone back.
‘You know I feel bad about wasting the estate agent’s time,’ he says.
‘It’s their job . . .’
‘Shall we just get this wedding done first?’
‘Fine,’ I say. I put the phone down and pour a new load of pasta into the bubbling pan of water. ‘The wedding . . . now with Dr Therone,’ I say, staring into the pan.
‘Maybe she can be your bridesmaid,’ Josh says in his jokey way. I turn with my wooden spoon in the air.
‘Too soon. Too bloody soon.’