Pork Chops

Although he couldn’t save his wife, Matthew said he was lucky to escape the woods. Later, it came out that, onthe first day of the hike, as he’d planned all along, he hit her on the head with a stone and pushed her off a cliff. Her body struck the rock wall twice, then crashed through the canopy of trees below. Some of her short mousey hairs stuckto the stone, which he chucked after her. He timed twenty minutes on his watch then called for help. No one came. Even so, he kicked loose pieces of dirt from the edge of the trail, so it would appear, if anyone looked, that he’d tried to scramble down after her.

Uncle Dan asked why he’d wanted to murder his wife, and Matthew shook his head and said he wasn’t sure; it seemed for the best. He’d not loved her anymore. There’d been something about how she ate pork chops, nibbling deliberately round the bone, her teeth snipping together with little clicks. When they’d first met, it was something cute he’d noticed, but soon…just the way she’d keep going until each bone was stripped. It got at him, until he could barely stand to be in the same room when she ate. 

“You killed her because of how she’d clean a bone?” Aunt Babs asked.

She laughed, clicking her own teeth.

“No,” said Matthew, “Not just that. It was one thing, one of a million little things that all add up. You know what I mean? Surely, you do?!”

He looked between us all, hoping to find one understanding face. He’d had the same desperate look when he burst out of the woods; filthy and hungry; his expensive hiking clothes ripped and bloody, which fell to pieces as he walked. As he’d made his way back along the trail, he’d realized the map and compass were in his wife’s knapsack, thewater too. Even on well-used trails, it’s easy to go astray.

“Please understand,” he said.

He told us about how, before he rolled her over the edge, her jittering heels cut half-moons in the dirt.