The Water Pitcher

Some of you know I've been working on a story called 'The Water Pitcher', based loosely on my Mom and Dad and one of their first fights about who should fill up the water pitcher. Course it's all fiction and it makes my Mom and Dad out to be much cooler and collected than I'm sure they were (that's not an insult, that's what my Mom said, too), but it's a fun little story.

It'll take you like 10 minutes to read. Just thought you might enjoy giving it a read through.

I'm also open to suggestions on it. There's never a finished work.

Tamra

The Water Pitcher

Mel opened his eyes. It was Tuesday morning and the clock said 4:01. He slowly pulled off the covers and tiptoed in the dark to the bathroom connected to the bedroom. He quietly shut the door and then turned on the light so Janell, still sleeping, wouldn’t be bothered. It wasn’t that Mel couldn’t sleep. He’d been waking up around 4:00 a.m. since the beginning of High School and his body wasn’t about to change that now. Without an alarm clock, without any external cues, he was up every day between 4:00 and 4:05 a.m.
After an efficient few minutes Mel walked out of the bedroom ready for the day and plopped himself down on the couch in the front room a little before 4:15 a.m. He looked down at the stack of books on the couch and shuffled through until he found “Modern Chemistry.” Mel was taking 20 credit hours at the University of Cincinnati, and he took his school work seriously. He had a near-photographic memory that had served him well in past schooling and would keep facts in his head for years to come, but he wouldn’t rely on his memory alone. School was too important for that.
A little after 6:30 he heard the alarm buzzing behind the closed bedroom door. Janell wasn’t a morning person; he knew it would take her another two more alarm buzzes to actually get up. Mel smiled to himself and glanced past the green cinder block makeshift bookshelf, to the kitchen, where the water pitcher caught his eye. The pitcher had been a wedding gift from Janell’s parents. It wasn’t grossly expensive, but it was nice glass with ivy leaves delicately etched around it, as if growing up the sides. Besides being the loveliest pitcher they owned, it was also the only pitcher they owned. Despite its dainty look, it was actually of very sturdy construction: heavy, with a thick glass handle attached artistically, but stably to the basin. And right now, it was sitting on the counter where it had been firmly planted for over 36 hours. The smile left Mel’s face. There still wasn’t water in the pitcher. He’d have to talk to Janell about that, like he’d been meaning to.
The alarm sounded the twice more Mel was expecting and then he heard her stirring in the bedroom. He knew her routine and how long it took her to start being awake and getting ready for the day. He got off the couch, walked into the kitchen and touched the empty water pitcher before he opened the fridge and looked inside to find a few apples, some pickles in a jar, a gallon jug half full of milk, a couple slices of bread in a bag, and a dozen eggs, but no cold water. He shut the fridge door and again looked at that water pitcher. He called to her just as loud as he needed for his voice to carry into the other room, “Janell!”
Mel heard a light shuffle, water turning quickly on, then off again, then soft, padded footsteps. The doorknob creaked when it turned and out walked Janell, short, beautiful, in her bathrobe. White curlers occasionally showed among her thick, long, auburn hair. A single strand of hair fell in front of her grey-blue eyes. She bounced a little as her bare toes stepped lightly on the soft, off-white carpet. She entered the kitchen and her feet thudded on the cold tile. She stopped a few feet away from Mel, his eyes fixed on her face and his jaw falling ever so slightly. “Yes, Mel?” she asked, her hands still adjusting some of the curlers.
Mel almost smiled, then cleared his throat. He pointed to the pitcher on the counter top and tried to be stern. “Th-this water pitcher has been sitting here empty for two days. Have you noticed?”
“Sure.” Janell played with her hair and adjusted a few more curlers. Her feet fidgeted and her toes curled in and out.
“Well, why didn’t you fill it up and put it back in the fridge?” he asked, fighting back his urge to just tell her she was beautiful.
“I didn’t empty it.”
“Why should that make a difference? If you see it here, fill it up,” he said, gesturing from the pitcher to the sink.
Janell leaned against the wall. “Mel, honey, I thought that you wanted it empty.”
“Why would I want it empty? You know I like cold water.”
“I know,” she said. She furrowed her face as if in deep thought. “But you had the last glass of cold water and then sat the pitcher on the counter. You know it doesn’t fill itself. So I thought maybe you liked looking at it empty.” She looked at Mel with a little twinkle in her eyes. “It is such a pretty pitcher,” she added.
Mel melted just a little. Then he picked up the pitcher, trying for a compromise. “Well, next time could you just fill it up?”
She walked over to him, leaned forward on her tiptoes, kissed him gently on the cheek, then started walking back to the bedroom and said over her shoulder, “Nope.”
Mel stared down the hallway at her, not knowing what to say next. “Please?” he begged.
“Nope.” She kept walking down the hall, past the picture of her parents and siblings on the right-hand wall, and past the figurines borrowed from his father on shelves mounted to the left-hand wall.
“You’re just being stubborn, Nellie,” he insisted in one last attempt to win the battle.
“Yep,” she said, not even looking back, and then closed the bedroom door behind her.
Mel stood in the kitchen, unmoved from the position he was in when the conversation started. He looked down at the pitcher, then back at the bedroom door and shook his head as he walked to the sink and filled up the water pitcher. He put it back in the fridge so it would be there, cold, waiting for him when he got back from school and work. There was a lot on their plates as almost starving newly wed students: he was going to school full-time and working full-time and Janell was working full-time and somewhere in there they also had to fit in their marriage and, later, their kids. But for now he didn't have to be to school for another half hour, so he drifted back to the couch and plopped down.
He looked over his shoulder and the back of the couch to the bedroom door, still closed. Then he leaned back, sighed, picked up his chemistry book, and tried to study. But Mel found himself unable to put his whole heart and mind into the task. Usually he was very precise when he studied, focusing so hard he often lost track of full hours in the day. But right now the text book was not appealing. He read three pages, taking notes and missing the most important things. He wondered when she would come out that door.
He glanced around the room: the wooden clock he’d made in shop class in high school, the mantel over the fireplace that didn’t work, the quilts and blankets piled in the corner for convenient access when cuddling on the couch. He put his hand on the stack of books next to him, opened the top book—Economics—and flipped through a few pages, all highlighted yellow. Reluctantly, he shook his head and forced himself to focus. Two pages more he read, this time forgetting note-taking all-together. He'd end up re-reading all five pages that night.
Looking at the bedroom door again, hopeful, he closed his book with his fingers still in it, then set the book to the side and stood up. He hesitated a little as he thought about what he’d say. “Should I ask for an apology? Should I apologize to her?” His thoughts spun around his head. “Or should I just tell her what I’ve been meaning to say all morning?” He looked back at the clock—still enough time to go tell her what he had to say and make it to school on time. His eyes never left the door as he walked around the couch, down the hall and to the door. He paused again, wondering why she hadn’t come out of the room yet, and then turned the doorknob. He slowly opened the door and there she stood with her back towards him, fully clothed, hair done, her hands at her ears clipping on her earrings. "The most beautiful woman in the world," Mel thought. All thoughts of who should apologize, or getting to school on time left his mind. He knew what he had come in there to do.
She turned towards him and smiled her normal comfortable smile—not pushy or overbearing, just letting you be what you wanted to be, whatever that was. She finished with her earrings, put her hands by her side as if to say, “I am finished,” and asked, "How do I look?"
The first time Janell had ever asked him that, he was speechless; he could only oogle. That was six years ago when she was 15 and their romance had just started; he had learned since then. He fell into her eyes and let himself stay in their deep blue warmth. "Beautiful,” he said. “Always beautiful." Then he walked over to her, she said, "Thank you," and he kissed her.