There’s Nothing Better
“There’s nothing better than a crusty bread with good butter.” His eyes converging inwards, Alexander stalked a slice of toast about two inches from his nose and bit into it. It made a sound. Then he closed his eyes and leaned back into his wooden chair. The fireplace was whistling with heat and tiny tendrils of night air sneaked through the closed windows.
“What about getting exactly what you want out of life?” Earnest replied in his low, open register.
“I am getting exactly what I want out of life.” Alexander took another bite of toast. His eyes were still closed.
“Okay smart ass. What about sex?”
“What about sex?”
“You think bread is better than sex?”
“That’s not what I said.”
“Yes it is.”
“I said there’s nothing better than a crusty bread with good butter.”
“Fine. So crusty bread with good butter is better than sex?” Earnest imitated Alexander’s stresses and cadence perfectly.
“Yes. It is.”
“You’re absolutely full of it, Alex.”
The two ate their supper for a while in silence, the only sounds now coming from the fire, the winter crickets outside, and their crunching. All their hiking gear lay out on the floor around the fireplace; the snow was evaporating straight off of their boots and coats.
Alex was the one to speak after a while. “So what are you going to do when you get back?”
“Go back to work. What else would I do?”
“I don’t know. Just curious I guess. And how’s Andrea?”
Earnest sighed. “She’s alright. Still nags me about everything these days. I don’t know when it got so bad between us. Sometimes the kids see us and I feel like such a failure. Did your parents ever fight? Mine never fought.”
“Mine never fought, no. Although my dad hardly ever spoke to my mom unless it was an order to bring something to the dinner table.”
“Hm. But they never raised their voices?”
“Nope. Not even once.”
“Damn. I haven’t asked you yet by the way—any luck on the woman front?” Earnest buttered another thick crust of bread and noisily bit into it.
“Some,” Alex replied, “I was seeing this woman for a bit the other month; she was divorced and would say some other guy’s name in her sleep, so I broke it off.”
“Got it. And you’re still at the same place right? The dealership?”
“Still there, yeah. It’s alright.” Alexander combed through his bushy moustache for crumbs and shoved them back into his mouth. He had a large, practically comical nose with huge round nostrils. They flared when he stuffed the crumbs into his mouth. “So tomorrow we climb the rest then. Heard it’s one hell of a summit, too.”
“I heard it’s supposed to snow another eight inches. All night tonight and into tomorrow morning.”
“We got snowshoes, don’t we?” Alex asked rhetorically. Their snowshoes were defrosting by the fire.
Earnest didn’t respond. Instead he listened to the wind pick up outside. It howled and howled, drowning out the sound of the crickets and the crackling of the fire. He wished it would just snuff out the whole world.
“You’re absolutely full of it Alex.” Earnest paused to listen again, and then spoke. “I think there’s nothing better than a steaming mug of coffee with good cream.” White vapor lifted off of their snow pants on the stone floor by the fire.