Domestics

2003 I’m Glad Julie Galvin’s Not My Girlfriend Anymore Award for Fiction

I regret squeezing the hemorrhoid ointment into Jake’s toothpaste tube. We were actually getting along that evening even though neither one of us said anything about it. We didn't want to jinx it. But then, after we got back to my apartment, I went into the bathroom, unscrewed the cap off his toothpaste and squirted the ointment into his blue toothpaste. I swirled it around with a Q-tip, lit a candle to keep the bathroom dark, and got in the shower. It didn’t take long before Jake joined me. I forgot about the toothpaste while we slathered soap over each other before fucking.

After I crawled into bed, I heard Jake brushing his teeth. Then I heard him spitting. Then gagging. I ignored him at first. I bit on the blanket while I tried to keep myself from laughing.

“Did you do something to my toothpaste?” he screamed, pulling the blanket out of my mouth.

I was laughing and he kept yelling, “What did you put in my toothpaste?”

I assured him it was just a little hemorrhoid ointment.

He ran to the bathroom to read the label. The container was rather old and bent up, and the warning was scratched out. “It says something about calling the physician.”

“That’s only if you develop a hemorrhoid in your mouth. It was preventative medicine.” I laughed so hard I ran to pee.

Jake put his clothes on and left for his own home.

Early on, Jake was the prankster and had suggested I write my utility bill checks off by a few cents. “That really screws them up,” he said.

“Yeah,” I chuckled. He seemed disappointed with my lack of enthusiasm.

We just don't prank alike.

One night I pulled out a used tampon and slipped in into his pillowcase. In the morning, he hadn’t noticed it until I started laughing. “What did you do? Tell me. I know it’s sick.”

I pointed to his pillowcase and he saw the used tampon and ran to the bathroom to puke.

A week later, I paid a friend to make a silkscreen shirt with a warped looking toothpaste tube encircled by the words: I’m Sorry. Are You? I left it in his mailbox and later that night, Jake came over wearing it, carrying a six-pack.

Forgiven, Jake wore the tee-shirt in bed and told me it was pretty amazing I turned out an accountant after being raised in a family that never paid a bill until the utilities were cut.

“I think it was your check trick with the utility company that made me interested in money,” I said.

I just couldn’t break doing those pranks. Lately, we had been talking about marriage, or at least moving in together, and the more we looked at homes, the more obsessed I became with pranks. A couple of weeks ago, Jake had to go on a business trip. We had a few drinks in the airport lounge before he left. At one point, he left to go to the bathroom and I opened his suitcase and squeezed catsup on his underwear, then stuck it in the bottom of his suitcase. I’m sure people noticed, but no one warned him.

Later that night, he called from the hotel to thank me for the sexy note and new watch I had wrapped and left on the top of the suitcase.

The next day there was a message on my phone that he was taking the taxi home and to stay away from him. “You’re sick. Really sick, Lisa.”

In the beginning, if we had drunk enough, he’d play along with me and do something disturbing in revenge. But after awhile, he quit doing anything in return and just left.

Three days have passed since the ointment and Jake refuses to answer the phone. Yesterday he sent an e-mail that said: “Find a therapist.”

I drank too much. Then drove by Jake’s. I saw him sleeping through the bedroom window. I have a key and let myself in. He always prepares his coffee the night before. I went to the bathroom, peed into a coffee cup, emptied out the water from the coffee maker, then refilled it with urine. I laughed all the way home. Felt good to laugh again.

This morning I called and he still wouldn’t answer the phone. When the answering machine clicked on, I just laughed and laughed and laughed until the tape ran out. I shouldn’t have done that either.

Diane is not Lisa. Really.