‘How many times do we have to have this discussion, Harold?’ my new wife asked, exasperatedly throwing her driving gloves onto the bed. ‘It grows tiresome.’
‘Bah!’ I waved a hand at her outburst. ‘Tiresome? What’s tiresome is how often I have to beg my own wife for support in every issue! Jenkins from the club, his wife—’
‘Probably never had her husband demand a bath tub conversion!’ Hilde interrupted me. ‘It’s obscene!’
‘It’s hardly obscene,’ I scoffed, walking to the bar cart and pouring myself a whiskey. ‘It’s just a cut-out, to make it easier to slip in and out of.’
‘I didn’t realise that was a problem we faced,’ she frowned. ‘How long have you been unable to slip in and out of your baths, dear?’
‘Oh, it’s not like that,’ I protested, absentmindedly muddling her martini.
‘Isn’t it?’ she arched an eyebrow, like only she knew how. ‘Tell me, are you just chasing some fad from Sydney? Bathtub modifications for senior citizens to use the bath, co-opted by the youth?’
‘I’d hardly say it’s a co-option–’
‘It’s Jenkins, isn’t it!’ she said with a start. ‘I knew it! You’ll do anything that man tells you!’
‘I most certainly will not!’ I cried, face reddening as I passed her the drink. She took it gratefully, even as her eyes bore into my own. ‘But Jenkins is a gentleman and a visionary, who just so happens—’
‘To have told you to cut a hole in the side of your bathtub,’ she shook her head. ‘Honestly, Harold, I’m stunned at your blindness sometimes.’
‘My vision is clear!’ I thundered. ‘It is you who cannot see what the future shall bring.’
She shook her head, downed her martini and stormed out of the room.
‘The future, Hilde!’ I cried after her. ‘The future is upon us!’
A door slammed somewhere down the hall. Hilde was not impressed.