3WW (Pulse, Shard, Weary): Decided Outcomes

They had already decided the outcome. Twenty years couldn’t save them. Neither could their three children. Not the joint accounts. Not the house, worth less than the mortgage. Not the marriage certificate placed neatly in the top drawer of the file cabinet. They had tried a counselor, a long weekend together in the Poconos, and a week apart. They told the kids that dad had a business trip. They felt weary, drained from the ordeal. Where love had once flourished, only frustration and doubt remained.

Andy woke to find himself on the futon. Sheets kicked off. The pillow wet from his drool. He looked at the alarm clock. Late again. His wife didn’t wake him anymore. Not since the day he told her to stop harping on him. He showered and shaved, grabbed a chocolate filled pop tart and took a bite. He tossed the rest into the garbage, remembering too late how much he hated pop tarts.

He started the car, let it warm. Checked his almost dead crackberry. Of course, he forgot to charge it the night before. A few new messages. One from his boss reminding him of the job for which he couldn’t be late. For which he was already late. The next message was also from his boss; he didn’t read it. The Civic sped down the highway. The sticker in the upper left of the windshield mocked him; he was three months late and about 5000 miles over. No time to think about an oil change.

His pulse quickened as the traffic thickened. But he stayed at a steady 60 mph and reached the exit to the hospital in short order. He paid no attention to the incoming messages of his irate boss. Instead, he pulled into an illegal parking space and raced to the elevators that would take him to the fourth floor. He stepped into the room 12 minutes late. And the doctor proceeded to take another 7 minutes to explain how valuable her time was. By the time she finished, the truck with the new equipment had arrived, meaning that everything – at 20 minutes late – was right on time.

Still, Andy felt the pressure of making this move perfect. He hadn’t been living up to the reputation that preceded him from his prior job. Not since his relationship had plummeted into the abyss of uncertainty. He knew he needed only to focus and he’d make it work. He could show how he had come to be known as ‘Handy Andy’.
The move was a relatively simple one. A swap. A new piece of machinery for an old one. The keys to moving two-ton pieces of machinery are levers and wheels. If either one fails, then, unless you have at least four men from a strong man competition, it’s going to be a while. Andy instructed his assistant to position himself on the opposite side of the machine. Andy needed to nudge the machine from its resting place with a lever – the wheels had made an indentation in the floor from the weight of the machine – and then they could begin to wheel it towards the door. Slowly.
The lever worked. So did the rolling. For about three feet. Then one of the wheels began to wobble. Andy’s instinct was to grab for the bottom to lift it. But no man could lift two tons. The wheel failed and the machine’s full weight came down on Andy’s hand. In a split second, it was over.

The nurse ran to Andy to see the damage. But there was no damage. Instead, Andy’s left hand was unscathed. She looked to the ground and saw shards of tile where the wheel had failed. But no blood. No sign of an injury. Andy just sat on the ground. The doctor entered and asked what the hell he was doing on the floor. But Andy said nothing. Nor did the nurse. Instead, Andy stood and grabbed the lever. He gave instructions to his assistant to steady the machine. And he lifted the machine to put the wheel back into place. The nurse noticed that he slipped a piece of the tile into his pocket.

The move went smoothly after that. Handy Andy had worked his magic.
That night, Andy arrived home well after his wife. Instead of avoiding her, as he had each of the previous nights that week, he went into ‘their’ room and closed the door.

‘Andy, we can’t keep talking about this. We’ve tried everything.’ She waited for him to start in on his usual rant.

‘Not everything,’ was all he said.
She waited for him to speak, but he didn’t. Instead, he raised his left hand to her face. She eyed his hand for a moment. Then her eyes widened.

‘You took off the ring.’

‘Nope,’ he countered quickly.

She grimaced. ‘Well, it’s not on your finger.’

He pulled the dented titanium ring from his pocket and showed her.

‘How the hell did you do that?’

He told her.

She waited for him to finish. Then, she waited longer. He didn’t interrupt the silence. In fact, the silence lingered until morning when they awoke in each others’ arms. It seems the outcome had not yet been decided.