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The Secret Within

Tony Ransom

    The sound of a ringing doorbell wakes a couple from their slumber. “Who is it?” asked the husband in a low groan.
    “I don’t know. Go and check,” replied the wife in a similar fashion.
    “No, I went last time,” said the husband.
    “You know what fine, George, I’ll go,” she said while sitting up in bed with a scowl on her face. “Some people never change.” She rotated her body so that her legs were off the side of their king size mattress. After a quick yawn, she slipped her feet into her pink, fluffy bedroom slippers and shuffled across the dirty floor to the door. As she looked back at her husband she realized he hadn’t moved a muscle. She snickered at how uncaring he seemed. “I’ll make sure to not scream if it’s a murderer. I’d hate for you to lose a wink of sleep.”
    “Every time I don’t do exactly what you want me to do you always turn it into a First 48 case,” George said. “So how ‘bout we both go together. It’s not like I worked a double last night.” Without a second thought, he threw the covers off his body and onto the bedroom floor. Wearing nothing but pajama pants, he hurried over to his wife. “Don’t worry, I’ll lead the way, Lisa.”
    “You don’t have to sound so angry,” said Lisa in a muffled voice. George swung the door open and hurried down the thirteen wooden steps to the first floor of their house. Lisa watched on from their bedroom doorway. She knew she was wrong but refused to apologize at the moment.
     George got to the front door and swung the door open faster than he did his bedroom door.
    “Who is it,” she said from the top of the steps just loud enough for him to hear.
    “It’s no one. Probably just one of the neighborhood kids screwin’ around,” George shouted as his eyes naturally panned downward. “There’s a box here, though. Maybe UPS left it.”
    “What does it look like?” she asked.
    “You’d know if you ever make it down the steps,” he said back.
    “Fine,” she replied as she hurried down the steps and to his side.
    She leaned and looked at the box. It was large and purple with a white envelope attached to the right side. The envelope read: “To George and Lisa.”
    “It says it’s for us, George. Pick it up and bring it into the kitchen.”
    “Ma’am,yes, ma’am,” George said while saluting to his wife.
    “I didn’t mean it like that, George, but if you’re gonna keep being a dick I’ll do it,” she said as she ripped the box up off the welcome to our happy home mat that was sitting on the front stoop. She rushed into the kitchen and tore the envelope off the side of the box. She read it aloud, “To the ‘happy’ couple. A marriage shouldn’t be built on lies. Open up the box to learn the truth about each other. From someone who cares.”
    George slowly entered the kitchen. Their widened eyes met as George gulped. The room was filled with both curiosity and fear. Lisa put her hand on the fringe of the lid of the box. The two never lost eye contact.
    “Something you wanna tell me,” they both said simultaneously.
    “I guess we’ll find out,” said George.
    “I guess we will,” Lisa replied with tears in her eyes.
    George slowly walked over to Lisa’s side as she took the lid off the box. They both looked inside. There was another note at the bottom that read, “Have fun knowing that you’re both keeping something from the other. From the person who just ruined your ‘happy’ marriage.”
    Lisa wiped the tears from her eyes, and George scratched the back of his head and exhaled loudly. They both turned to each other. They could feel how desperate each other was to know and how unwilling they were to tell. They both opened their mouths as if they were about to confess and then shut them as if they lost the right words.
    “We need to talk,” they both whispered.

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