Short Stories

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The loaf of bread my wife suggested I buy on the way home from work just sat there, on the shelf, just waiting to leave the orphan status behind in search of a better life. Little did Split Wheat know that its life expectancy was on the verge of getting shorter, as the love of my life ate bread like candy corn, popping a few slices a day to keep the doctor away.

The anticipation that this old loaf was feeling was one of desperation, hoping beyond hope that this would be the day it’d be getting tossed into paper or plastic. I picked up that loaf of bread, despite my disdain for its asking price, and took the little fellow to the express lane in hopes of making a clean break in under two minutes.

It was Monday night, and having been held up at the office by a series of backlogged reports, I was heading home much later than I normally would. With the football game set to begin in less than twenty minutes, my short trip to the grocery store was the slight annoyance I’d have to endure before my back finally hit the sofa and my body proceeded to call it a day.

The gentlemen standing in front of me was taking an extended period of time checking his items in at the price scanner. That’s when I noticed my left leg beginning to twitch, tapping the floor ever so slightly in a manner that demanded an increased rate in this fellow’s tortoise-like pace. The fact that the man couldn’t have been a day over seventy-seven didn’t generate any sympathy from my end.

While this express line strongly suggested a limit of eight items per stop, that didn’t prevent me from scouting out the old man’s grocery list right there on the spot. “That man had twelve items!” I exclaimed to myself. The nerve of this guy, invading the lane of the expeditious, causing the suspension of urgent flow like fender-benders would do on Main Street.

But as item number twelve finally found its way to the surface, the inaudible sigh of relief slipped silently from my mouth. The mouth dropped open, however, when I saw the old guy looking around for what appeared to have been a missing item. I could not believe it, the luck of all luck that had been mine that evening, being placed directly behind the human rain delay.

While becoming increasingly annoyed by the injustice committed by this retail-inhibited individual, I noticed a young boy approaching the man, holding something firmly in his hand. It was a card, a rather pretty card if I was going to be honest, and I was able to obtain a glance of its content before the man submitted the item for final price checking. It read:

“TO MY WIFE OF 50 YEARS; I THANK THE LORD ABOVE FOR EVERY MINUTE SPENT WITH YOU.”

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