CAUGHT!!!

My wife came home from work yesterday, a little bit earlier than I expected. I was surprised, and as I jumped up I tried to throw on an air of nonchalance. “Oh, hi, baby, how are you doing?” I said, and I moved to kiss her hello. But then she stopped, looked around our apartment, and her eyes narrowed. My wife is not an unattractive woman, but when she wants to she can conjure up a fairly good imitation of Margaret Hamilton, the woman who played the Wicked Witch of the West. When she gives me this look, we call it a “Margareting.” She usually does it in jest, and we chuckle about it, but this time, it seemed, she was in earnest. She growled, low, like an angry cat issuing a warning. “You bastard…”
“Honey, I didn’t mean to, I swear to God…!”
“How could you?” She demanded. “I thought we went over this! You said you were going to…”
I cut her off, attempting to allay the damage I’d done. “I know, I know, I know, honey, and I’m sorry. I really am. I just got carried away, and .. well… you know, one thing led to another, and…” I gestured around myself futilely.
She dropped her bags, slumped into a chair, and her face fell into her hands for a long moment. I stood there, helpless to explain myself.
When at long last she looked up, she gazed around and sighed. The hardwood floors of our apartment gleamed. I’d spent an hour or so chasing all the bits and crumbs and detritus of ours and our 2-year old’s existence out of the corners. I’d vacuumed the rug, put away all the baby’s toys, and put the pillows on the couch back in order. The stacks of books and magazines that normally occupied our kitchen table, making it impossible to eat a meal without major rearranging first, had all been put back on the shelves, or in the magazine rack in the bathroom. The cloth placemats and napkins were neatly folded on the table, awaiting our next meal.
Her voice came out of her in a long, exasperated sigh. “You CLEANED!” she said.
“I know. I’m sorry.”
“I suppose the laundry is done, too.”
At this point, I figured a full confession was my best bet. “Yeah,” I said.
“Folded?” She queried.
“Uh-huh.”
“Put away?”
“Yeah.”
“Kitchen?” she said, her voice and her eyebrows arching dangerously.
“Um….” Full confession was not looking like such a good move anymore.
“Kitchen??” she said again, her voice diving precipitously downward toward that cat-growl range again.
“Dishes are done.” I stammered. “I swept the floor. But I didn’t mop!” I said.
“You ASSHOLE!” she finally let loose. “I thought you were going to look for a job!!!”
“I tried to!” I said. “But… but…”
“But what?” she said. “I suppose this all started with you taking out the garbage.”
“Uh… kind of.” I said. “Then I kinda noticed that, as long as I was going to take out the garbage, I should probably get all the crap from off of the kitchen sink cleaned off first, and then next thing you know, I just kinda got carried away with it all. But I swear to God, I didn’t touch the bathroom!”
She ignored this feint. “And how long did it take you to do all this?” she said.
“Oh, not too long,” I said, lamely.
“Really? How long?”
“About two hours,” I said, lying through my teeth but trying to sound convincing. I was just praying she didn’t notice the two buckets drying on the front porch. Truth of the matter is, I’d spent 45 minutes on my hands and knees that afternoon scrubbing crusted, dried baby food off the floor in the dining room. I hoped she didn’t notice what I’d done to the baseboards. They reeked of Simple Green.
Turns out you can find a lot of things to do instead of job hunting. At last my wife got up and headed into the baby's room to drop off her bookbag. "You do this again, we're going to go see a counselor." she said.