Her Missing Husband by Diney Costeloe

She was dead, no doubt about that. She lay on the kitchen floor, her eyes staring up at him, the blood still pooling round her neck. She was dead and he’d killed her.
    Jimmy Randall looked down at his wife, Mavis, and was suddenly consumed with fury.
    Stupid bitch! Stupid, fucking bitch. She was dead on the floor and he’d killed her, but it had been her fault. All... her... fault! He hadn’t meant to kill her, silly bitch, but she shouldn’t have grabbed the knife. He was only trying to take the knife off her! She shouldn’t have pushed him away neither, screaming that she’d never let him touch her again. Never touch her again? She was his wife, for Christ’s sakes. He was entitled. So what if he had been to the pub with Charlie and had a few? No harm in that. He’d had a hard day and earned a drink or two. He hadn’t spent the day moping at home with only a baby to look after. Mavis should have had his tea on the table when he got in. What good was it being tied to one woman if she couldn’t even have his tea ready when he came home? If she pushed him away when he was in the mood for a good fuck? It was all her fault.
    Any man would’ve lost it, any man who was a man and boss in his own house. No man would want to come home and find his wife drooping at the kitchen table, wailing and dripping tears. Any man would be tired of her miseries, moaning on and on about stuff that had been decided between them months ago.
    Jimmy strode up and down the tiny kitchen muttering imprecations. ‘Stupid bloody cow! Stupid fucking bitch! All your fault... and now you’re dead.’ He reached down and grabbed the knife, pulling it free with another gush of blood and tossing it away so that it slithered across the floor and disappeared under the gas cooker.
    He turned his back on the rag-doll body and for the first time looked down at himself. He was covered in blood where the first spurt had sprayed him as they’d struggled for the knife. It was all over his clothes; he could feel it sticky on his face and when he held out his hands he saw it on his palms, bloodied again when he’d pulled the knife free. A faint sound came from the body, like the exhalation of a sigh, and Jimmy spun round, terror in his eyes. Christ! She wasn’t dead! Mavis wasn’t dead after all! But then he saw that she was, still lying in a crumpled heap on the floor, her eyes still staring up at him, the wound in her throat still leaking blood out onto the lino.
    Think! He had to think! Still fuddled with drink it was difficult, even more difficult with Mavis staring up at him like that, and he turned abruptly away. What happens if somebody comes knocking at the door? There’d be no escape if he were found here, with Mavis dead on the floor and him covered in her blood.
    Shit! he thought. I gotta get out of here before someone comes.
    He looked at the clock on the kitchen shelf and saw that it was barely nine o’clock. Still, it was unlikely anyone would come calling at this time of a winter’s night. Surely he had time to get himself cleaned up and escape into the darkness. With luck he’d have disappeared and be well away before anyone found what was left of Mavis.
    With one final glance at his dead wife, he resolutely turned his back and walked out of the kitchen, closing the door firmly behind him.
    His heart was beating fast, but he made himself breathe slowly and deeply. He needed to calm down while he decided what to do next. He had to get out of the house and away, so he had to get cleaned up – his face, his hands, his clothes. Yes, clean clothes were a must, and Jimmy went upstairs to find some. When he reached the bathroom and saw his face in the mirror, smeared with Mavis’s blood, he shuddered. He had to get it off, to clean every vestige of her away. He shed his blood-stained clothes, leaving them in a stinking heap on the bathroom floor, and turned on the taps. The geyser woompfed into life and he climbed into the bath, scrubbing