The Pristine Housewife

The sun rose sleepily over the horizon, as if it were struggling to climb out of bed and sprayed the newly born sky with red as if paint was dripping down a canvas. Jenna was already up, sat in the small bay window of her dream suburban home, knees tucked under her, clutching a cold cup of tea to her breast. She was murmuring quietly to herself and frequently looked at the silver Rolex on her wrist; she knew she would have to leave the house soon, there were things she needed to do, errands she needed to run. Absent-mindedly she sipped the cold tea from her favourite star patterned mug and stood up in the quiet, empty living room, gazing at the chaos of broken furniture and smashed porcelain from her late mother’s figurine collection.

Slowly she made her way through the maze of debris, her slippers crunching every now and then on a decorative, ball gown clad woman and walked into the kitchen where she placed her mug carefully in the sink. Her eyes darted round the busy room uncomfortably and tried with earnest to avoid the area of tiled floor to her left. Instead she shuffled quickly out, pulling her pink dressing gown tighter around her, feeling a sudden chill run through her.

Upstairs was deathly quiet, until a young blackbird cut through the silence with its repetitive song. Jenna pulled on her best pair of skinny jeans and a low cut pink top that accentuated her natural curves. She looked in the mirror and began applying make-up; foundation, eyeliner, eye shadow, blush and finally her favourite shade of blood red lipstick her husband had bought for her last birthday. She hesitated slightly, looking at the deep red colour before confidently applying it to her plump lips. Grabbing the brush from the side she pulled her hair back and tied it neatly into a ponytail and smiled at herself in the mirror that so often showed what she wanted to see rather than her true reflection.

The blackbird finally stopped singing, but was instead replaced with the faint sound of sirens, probably an ambulance, Jenna thought as she grabbed her smartest black jacket from the wardrobe and pulled it around her shoulders. She looked around the room fondly and thought of how messy it had become, “I’ll have to clean this up later,” she sighed, then turned and walked back downstairs in her most expensive pair of leather boots.

The sirens were getting louder and Jenna wondered if they were coming to the aid of one of the elder residents in the street. She often watched them and wondered how much longer they had left. They eyed her with suspicion and disgust, though she never knew why, it wasn’t her fault she was so much better than them. She put a hand in her jacket pocket and felt something cylindrical, which turned out to be a bottle of prescription pills. Jenna looked at them in surprise, wondering how they had found their way into her clothes and tossed them casually aside, ‘I’ll sort them later,’ she thought as she returned to the kitchen and gazed finally at the tiled floor, now to her right.

“What am I going to do with you?” she asked her husband as she walked over to his lifeless body.  A pool of blood surrounded him like a moat and he stared blankly to the side as if trying to count the tiles on the floor. An irritated look passed over Jenna’s face as she turned away from him and walked out into the hall, “that better not stain the floor,” she called over her shoulder. The sirens were louder now; she guessed they were probably outside in the street though she still couldn’t understand why. When the knock came loudly on her front door, as well as the chime of the doorbell she still had no idea they had come for her and opened the door with her most perfect smile.