Gaslight -5minutefreewrite(x3)

in #freewrite5 years ago (edited)

"Don't you know that violence is an expression of an unmet need?" he said with a smile. She wanted to punch him in the face.

"Don't you know that pedantry is an expression of servitude?" she said, and pointed at the dirty floor.

Janet left the room, hoping that she'd made her point well enough that he'd mop the floor, and she'd be so happy with him for doing that that she'd lose the urge to punch him in the face.

It was a futile hope, but she went ahead and hoped it anyways.

Turning down the hallway, she found herself suddenly lost. In front of her was not a hallway, but a misty forest. She turned back around. There was the kitchen behind her, Tom looking sullenly at a mop, seeming paralyzed with indecision. She turned back to the forest. It was hard to imagine this was anything but a dream. But if it wasn't, was she prepared to leave her frustrating husband and very plain life for some magical forest that appeared in the hallway.

"Tom, I think I'm going on an adventure into a magical forest that appeared in our hallway," she called out. As she stepped forward and finished letting Tom know, the forest disappeared, and her hallway was once again her hallway.

"Yes, I can see that. I have to start correcting her behavior." Tom whispered into the phone.

Janet wasn't even surprised. Tom was the reason she was miserable. He wasn't overtly mean, she guessed. He was a little bit gaslight-y, but who wasn't. She'd been known to claim things to be true that weren't true. She'd said things like, "I love how little coffee you need," sarcastically. She didn't even know the purpose of saying those things, just that it would needle him a little. That's not the same, she thought, as him saying, "You always forget to take out the trash, and then I have to." Or "I take out the trash more than you, I think." She didn't even know if that was true or not. Maybe he even believed it. But, without a system of counting numbers of times they each took out the trash, which both were loathe to do because it felt like it'd be a symbol of their failing relationship...

Nobody felt like this. They both knew themselves inmostly, and they both felt themselves to be... No, that wasn't fair. Maybe he didn't. Maybe she was the awful one, and he was pure inside. Pure in a good way.

Or maybe. She was all topsy-turvy. What was truth? What wasn't truth? She couldn't even figure out where happiness lay. That damn forest. If only she had just left without saying anything, she thought.

Rain and lightning put an end to this. First it was lightening. But then came the clouds and the only lightening of the rain came alongside lightning, from which followed more rain and darkening.

Dark and light. Lightning.

The rain and lighting put an end to this charade. She saw him steer off the side of the road. The wetness of the asphalt presumably had caused this problem. Maybe he was blinded by lightning. It didn't matter why or how, but their relationship was over because he was surely dead. And if he wasn't she knew by the relief she felt that she would be able to leave him. Leave a now-broken man? She'd be the villain of the story, but that didn't even matter to her. She wanted joy again, and this was the only way...

The storm brought her such joy. It danced and blew. She watched the leaves. She watched droplets run. She watched. She watched. She watched.

IMG_20180919_190328.jpg

For https://steemit.com/freewrite/@mariannewest/the-weekend-freewrite-part-3-the-dramatic-twist-10-13-2018

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I'm not sure which was more intriguing, the forest that appeared in the hallway or the end that came at lighting speed.
As she continues to watch, here is the next prompt.

https://steemit.com/freewrite/@mariannewest/day-359-5-minute-freewrite-sunday-prompt-sustainable

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