The Cohabitants 15

She knew better than to look at herself in the bathroom mirror. No good could come of wrinkle pondering. Moisturizer had failed her. Lipstick crept up her lips to her nose in tiny red canyons as she wandered from room to room in the man’s house. Only three rooms and a hallway to the bathroom—so it wasn’t a long trip. Still, she felt lost. She was not at home here. Her frustrations were eating at her. Because of the Holiday Farm Fire, she hadn’t moved out of her apartment in Portland, she hadn’t really moved into this place, and she wasn’t writing what she thought she should be writing. Also, she was eating too much cheese. Thus, under compact fluorescents over the bathroom sink she looked for a new blemish to squeeze. She needed a psychic cleanse.

The man’s favorite coffee mugs were lined up on the vanity beside the sink and filled with the bits and bobs of his toiletries. When she cleaned the kitchen, she discovered a vast collection of fishing mugs festooned with fishing jokes, tournament names and angler aphorisms, most of which she donated to a thrift shop. But these three had art she appreciated—a Gary Larson cartoon, a hand painted rainbow trout, a bright blue underwater scene. The mugs were her strategy for containing small things in their boudoir, things that might otherwise be randomly strewn and abandoned like shells on a beach.

They’d been living together in his house for less than a week and both being very private, she had not seen him use his collection of itty-bitty grooming tools. He spent a lot of time fussing over himself, beautifully groomed at breakfast every day, hair combed, beard combed, mustache trimmed, no renegade nose hairs or ear hairs, none of the usual old man fuzz. He was fastidious. In complete contrast to the way he kept his house, he was attentive to every detail. He said his mother once told him a man should smell handsome.

Thank God for that woman.

To facilitate the maintenance of their shared grooming space, she guided him toward the goal of clear surfaces with the placement of the mugs. In one she put his three nail clippers, two nail files, three tweezers, a few dental picks, and his mustache scissors. In another, cottons swabs. In the third, toothbrushes and toothpaste. Now she adjusted their setting, wiped up the water spots around them, and aligned them along the vanity backsplash equidistant from each other. But even with that symmetry, she had a sudden aversion to the unnecessary aggregation. To relieve her angst, she threw away one of his tweezers. No one needs three tweezers. Plunk. In the waste basket. The empty space, though tiny, assuaged her dissatisfaction.

A blur of days later, while she was making breakfast, he took his seat at the kitchen table, freshly groomed and smelling handsome. “I used to have a pair of tweezers,” he said.

“You have two pairs of tweezers,” she replied smartly, as she sat down beside him.

“But my favorite pair of tweezers is missing.”

She sat back in her chair thinking this was a joke. “I don’t believe you have a favorite pair of tweezers.”

“I had a favorite pair of tweezers.” He wasn’t joking. “Now they’re missing.”

Maybe he’s having a stroke.

“Are you kidding me?”

“Why would I kid about tweezers?”

He’s got you there.

She laughed.

He looked bewildered. “Why is this funny?”

He has a favorite pair of tweezers.

She had thrown away an entire set of Teflon pans, all his soap, lotions and shampoo, a dozen ugly coffee mugs, a few hairbrushes, ratty towels, polyester sheets, mashed pillows, and he never uttered a word of acknowledgement.

“They were tweezers.” Her tone was incredulous.

“They were my favorite tweezers.” He was completely serious.

“Who has a favorite pair of tweezers?” She could hear the guilt in her voice.

“I do. Where are they?”

“I don’t know.”

Their household trash went into the garage and magically disappeared into his truck for deposit in a dumpster somewhere. By now his tweezers were probably buried in an Idaho landfill.

“They were in the mug in the bathroom.” The look on his face was intimidating. “What did you do with them?” 

Don’t say it.

“I threw them away.” There was a hint of defiance in her voice.

Shock raised his brows in disbelief as though she had just admitted throwing his truck key in the pond. “You threw away my tweezers?” His tenor ascended. “Why? Why would you throw away my tweezers?”

Because my wrinkles were really bothering me.

Don’t say that. 

“I needed a psychic cleanse.”

He gave her a withering look. A face she hadn’t seen. Utterly condescending and self-confident, holding his ground, shaming her. 

God, he’s sexy when he’s mad.

“Is this our first fight?” she asked cheerfully, still unsure if he was joking.

“My favorite tweezers are gone. I don’t see what there is to fight about.” He walked outside to fill the bird feeders.

Wow.

There was nothing left for her to do but apologize. The damage was done. He was scarred for life. Afterward, every time he lost something, he would mention that she’d thrown away his favorite tweezers. She just had to accept what she could not understand.