I have cheated on my spouse ...

Church Mice writers had the choice of two prompts this week - a story of cooking with 'corned beef' as a signature dish or the (fictional!) sentence starter 'I have cheated on my spouse - and it's not the first time.'  Some of us chose to combine the two!

“I do like a bit of corned beef,” Duncan said, biting into the thick slices of Hovis the aforementioned corned beef was encased in, an oozy splodge of peppery brown sauce squeezing onto his thumb as he did so. He licked it off with a breadcrumby tongue. Sally watched him in wonderment at his lack of basic table manners or hygiene - the thumb was still covered in engine grease -  but said nothing. Duncan seemed not to notice.

“She'll never make ‘em,” he sneered, waving the sandwiched-hand to the left as if his wife were standing beside him rather than back in her own kitchen some miles away. “If it weren't for you, Sal, I'd get nowt.”

“Not nowt, Duncan,” Sally said, wiping the Formica top clear of crumbs that had sprayed from his cement mixer of a mouth. “I thought you said she made you a snap box?”

“Snap box, I ask you!” Duncan guffawed, pebble-dashing the front of Sally's apron. “A few bloody salad leaves and a boiled egg! How's a chap to do a full day's work on bloody salad leaves and a boiled egg?”

“Healthier for you, though,” Sally smiled politely, glancing at Duncan's ample stomach as she turned away towards the counter. “And much fewer crumbs too,” she muttered wisely to herself.

 

Alison Mott