So I Was Thinking...

"So I was thinking," she says in a way that trails off at the end, audible ellipses that indicate there is more to come.

Shit, I think. She's thinking. Nothing good can come from that. Pretending as though I don't hear her, I reengage in what ever distracting task that frees me from the grasp of the impending doom of her idea.

"Babe?" Shit again. A term of endearment followed by a question mark, even more audible than the previous punctuation.

"What?" Maybe if I continue to pretend that I didn't hear the initial "so I was thinking" it will be like it never happened. I'm a deer caught in headlights, wide-eyed, rooted to the spot, not sure whether to run or brace myself for the unavoidable impact. She catches my buck eyes with a look of purpose, transfixed on my fear, awaiting the moment when her vehicular thoughts make brutal contact with my cervidae body.

"I was thinking…" Shit shit. Italics now, emphasizing the thinking, reiterating that some master plan is brewing inside her cauldron of a brain, a mixture of one part newt eye, three parts bat wing, and one soul of a thirty-year-old husband brought to a bubbling boil. The italics are again followed with the ellipses,  fangs protruding from a conceptual mouth, waiting to catch and latch onto some life source.

"Uh-huh…" I mutter in terror. This thought, I know, is not a thought at all - it's a decision, marked with all the underpinnings and implications of a thought, false politician-like diplomacy, a sword on which I will fall. This thought - the conjecture that will either, 1. Cost me money, 2. Take my time, 3. or make me go somewhere I know I already don't want to go. This idea, it has stalked me as its prey, smelled my fear, and whet its proverbial lips. Trapped, she goes to speak, inevitably ending this time with an exclamation point.

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