The Argument

Found a writing challenge online: 1. Why did Peter lose his temper with Joanna 2. Where did he go after he stormed out? 3. What happened to him when he got there?

The Argument

Vin Hill - Jan 2016

The door slammed behind him with a violent shudder at the top and bottom. He had already taken a few infuriated steps before he heard the pieces of glass shatter on the floor sharply behind him from the small port hole window. Un-phased, he didn’t dare to look back in fear that she would be there glaring at him from within the broken frame. Glass pointing inwards around her like a vicious tongue surrounded by a mouth of a jagged teeth; her face contorted a mixture of seething anger and shock. Before he knew it, he was out of the gate where he took a sharp turn left and stormed off down the street.

Peter Hannington rarely lost his temper, seldom did he lose it to his wife Joanna. In the two years since their marriage he had never once been driven to storm out of the house in any fashion. His thoughts writhing through this alien mentality as he clenched his hands so tight that he could feel the nails on this thumbs bend as his steel fingers stabbed into his sweaty palms.

‘Un-f*****g-believable’ he spat through his viced teeth in a loss of composure as he swung at the air uncontrollably. For a moment he looked directly through his crimson vision which was flooding the British suburban street, the blood rushing from the front of his cranium and twisted down his arms, sprilling under his fingers and into his tightening fists. The growing urge to find an object to hit before he reached up to his own hair to tear out suddenly took over his body. It was here that an innocent tree branch escaping a nearby garden fence had caught his attention to which he hilariously swung at it with his boulder like hands, leaves fell slowly to the ground in an anti-climatic drift while a group of children on their bikes across the streets giggled at the pink monster in bewilderment. Unsatisfied with the damage he had inflicted upon the willow tree, he thrust his foot through the freshly varnished fence from which the tree was escaping, unfortunately for the fence, the weight which Peter had gained from the six-pack beers over the past year projected him forward until the hole in the planks of wood came up to his lower thigh, losing his balance he collapsed in a heap on the ground with a hard thud heaving like a wounded Rhino caught in a poacher’s trap.

In an instant, regret washed over him in a wave of embarrassment. With the anger hastily retreating he took notice for the first time how much his heart was beating. With one leg stuck in the fence, he began to calm down and wonder just how exactly he’d gotten to this predicament.

He cast his memory back to the image of his wife as he turned to see her walking through the church aisle towards him. Her arm latched into onto her father with the utmost confidence that she was making the right decision by taking the hand of the fence kicking oath-to be, Peter Hannington. These images came back to him in slow motion as he replayed her eyes falling onto him with a smile erupting across her face, her hair slowly sweeping over her skin and she turned to her friends and loved ones in the pews. The father nodded to his son-in-law to be with great pride as he handed the hand of his pride and joy and it was here, stood before him in a the pale angelic dress looking more beautiful than anything he had ever seen that she took the moment to tell him something,

‘I always pick what we’re having for dinner!” she snapped viciously.

His eyes shot open to the old Irish woman of number 104 leaning over him. Her thick rimmed glasses sporting a brown tint from the years of cigarettes sat above her curling lips that rested over her toothless gums.

‘Domestic?’ she asked calmly with an intense glare, hands on her hips. Peter flinched in fear for a second for he knew that Mrs. What-ever-her-name was the owner of the fence in which he had his leg through. He nodded slowly in reply hoping she didn’t deservedly kick him, he was fully expecting it based on how she often screamed at the local children hitting stray balls into her garden. Peter didn’t really have an agenda to fend off a pensioner on his Sunday off.

‘Sorry, about the….er, fence’ He said withdrawing his leg carefully and sitting up.

‘Don’t be. It`ll give my lazy fecker somet’ing to do.’ She reassured referring to her elusive husband whom Peter had only seen only once. Peter stood up and felt a pain shoot up his leg as he put his oversized mass of weight onto it, ignoring it out of embarrassment he continued on.

‘So? What have you been arguing about?’ she asked throwing him a look, ‘Cheating? Too much drink?’ he was hesitant but chose to not aggravate her due to his inflicted damage upon her property.

‘Nothing like that.’ Submitted Peter, ‘Just stupid stuff.’

‘Try me.’ She asked impatiently. Peter hung his head low as he slowly limped back towards his house,

‘…Decision making.’ He said awkwardly. She rolled her eyes back with a tilt of her head,

‘Oh feck off!’ She exclaimed slowly with a hit on his shoulder. Taken aback he stopped in his tracks hoping that his pensioner-fighting nightmare wasn’t returning with a vengeance. ‘Fighting about who wants what? Pat’etic! You’re a grown man aren’t you?’ he stared back at her awkwardly feeling like he was a child being scolded by his grandmother. ‘Take off your dress and go home you little feckin’ girl’. He found himself nodding in a regrettable agreement with a blank expression, ‘And ill be wanting some money for me’ fence you hear?’  He nodded again and watched her wobble into her house, screaming after her submissive husband.

His leg wasn’t feeling any better by the time he reached his house, waiting at the gate with her arms crossed was Joanna. She glared at him intensively to which he attempted to counter attack with a weak smile of apology.

‘Dinner’s on.’ She snapped. Spinning on her heels, she stormed into the house with the broken pieces of glass crunching under her feet, leaving the door open behind her. He heaved out a sigh and slowly hobbled in after her, closing the door quietly behind him.

Author's Note

Go for gold, I have no formal training as a writer so i need all the feedback I can get.