Darlene tells me I have to wear a mask.
I come downstairs after a lousy night’s sleep… nightmares, about huge pink balloons with bright red ‘corona’ spikes, chasing me down the street.
I smell coffee, and bacon, and the nightmare begins to melt away. There’s a glass of orange juice waiting at my place at the breakfast table. The sun is streaming through the curtains, and birds are singing in the apple tree. I actually don’t know much about bird communication; it’s possible they’re actually arguing.
“Where’s you mask?”
Darlene is standing in the kitchen, holding a plate of bacon and eggs, and mug of fresh-brewed coffee. She is wearing a light blue, paper dust mask, but behind it, I can tell she’s scowling at me.
I give my head a quick shake, trying to clear out the cobwebs of sleep and nightmares. Did my wife really ask me, where’s my mask?
She repeats her question, with more insistence. “Where’s your mask?” She is standing in a certain posture — her feet spread and firmly planted on the kitchen linoleum — that suggests, in a not-so-subtle way, that I will not be granted coffee or breakfast unless I reappear decked out in a mask.
“Darlene, you were sleeping in the same bed with me, all night. We were breathing the same air. At very close quarters.”
“Don’t remind me,” she mutters.
“You expect me to eat bacon and eggs… and drink coffee… wearing a mask?” I ask in a somewhat pleading tone.
“Louis, it’s the law. This is not a joke. People’s lives are at stake. We’re in a pandemic.”
I am not going to win this thing with logic. Logic has no bearing whatsoever on the situation. I try negotiation instead.
“How about if I promise not to cough,” I suggest meekly.
“You need a mask, Louis.”
“But you’re already wearing a mask,” I remind her. “Do we both have to wear a mask?”
“Everyone wears a mask. People are dying out there.”
We look at each other from across the room. The birds continue arguing in the apple tree. The eggs are getting cold. I hate cold eggs almost as much as I hate masks. Yes, I will stoop to emotional manipulation. It’s the only way out.
I prepare the room by letting go a tender sigh. I relax my face, and cast my eyes down at the floor.
“Darlene my dear. My world has been turned upside down. I’ve lost my job. The bars are closed, and I haven’t seen my buddies in three weeks. There is really only one thing that keeps me from going totally insane. Seeing your smiling face across the breakfast table. But I can’t see your smiling face, because you have on that stupid mask. Can’t I see your smiling face?”
Turns out, the eggs are not totally cold… as Darlene smiles at me across the table, her mask now sitting atop her head like a tiny blue clown hat.
The birds have stopped arguing in the apple tree. Life is good.
Underrated writer Louis Cannon grew up in the vast American West, although his ex-wife, given the slightest opportunity, will deny that he ever grew up at all.