For the third time this week I’m stabbed by a fork by Judith Younger, Double Shot

Right under my thumbnail where it hurts like hell. Ever since he turned the flaps down on the cutlery basket and insists we put all the knives, forks, spoons in the squared holes, prong end, blade end, bowl end up. Which is turning my mornings into injury roulette. ‘They’re just not cleaning properly, the way you do it.’ He has felt the need to intervene after twenty years’ consideration of my dishwasher technique. For the third time this week I wonder how far I could ninja fling a fork and if I aimed carefully whether I could land it right in the side of his bristling neck. I wonder if the three pin point stabs would trail back to me or if I could pass it off as a toothy adder bite.

‘Make sure you rinse them this time.’ He is upset by washed spaghetti in his Weetabix while checking his phone. I know it will be her.

For the first time this week I wonder about her dishwasher style and if she stacks cutlery individually upright, pert and gleaming, or does she have a special drawer on top where they wait in spotless glossy promise. ‘I’ll be late again tonight. You should probably change the filter.’ He’s coming over to inspect, snapping his tongue round his teeth like one of those dart-mouthed frogs, and now for the first time I am scrolling and I am learning that, once embedded, pulling a fork from a neck causes severe and fast bleeding.

Judith Younger has recently discovered flash fiction and has had work published in several anthologies.

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