Returning to work; the marriage

"...Like yesterday when you added the wet laundry from the washer to the almost dry diapers in the dryer. That made me so mad."

"Yeah but I separated the diapers after everything dried."

"After I told you to."

"But I did it"

"yeah, but I thought about the ten minutes it would take to sort the diapers and that made me mad. Then I thought about telling you to do it and that made me feel like a nag. And feeling like a nag made me mad."

He giggles.

"Uh huh. See, I want to see this as funny. I know I'm being insane. But I can't even see this as a little funny. Even though, theoretically, insanity is very funny."

"What do you want exactly?"

"I want you to be me when I'm at work"

"I promise you I will never be you."

"Shut up"

"It's like you want everything to go exactly perfectly when you're gone, but you also want everything to go insanely wrong when you're gone."

"No. I want everything to go perfectly as long as you do things exactly the way I do them. And the second you deviate even an iota..."

"The house implodes."

"Right. And I come home to you, Tallulah, and Moxie sitting on the curb with big puppy dog eyes and a charred square where our house used to be. And I get to say, 'What did you do wrong?'"

"Yep. And then Moxie would start howling. I can see it; it could be a comic titled 'What happens when you don't do it my way'.

He giggles. And, finally, I do too.