Porridge and a new year

When Nina woke up she was pleased to see that her husband Hank was still asleep. At least on the first day of the year she had the opportunity of preparing breakfast for them. This was always Hank's job since Nina had awkward working hours and slept in when she could. To be completely honest though, thoughtful gestures such as preparing breakfast or the sleeved blanket he bought her when she once mentioned how she hated taking her arms out from under the blanket when watching TV, where Hank's territory. Although she loved him with every fibre of her being, these sorts of things just never occurred to her so she pounced on the opportunity and snuck out of bed.

She surreptitiously moved around the kitchen, putting the kettle on, pouring the orange juice, taking out the milk from the fridge and oats and bowls from the cupboard. This is where she paused. Hank was particular about his porridge bowl, was it the one that had a sleepy face with a protruding nose or the one with the orange rim that was more elongated? After changing her mind a couple of times she decided on the nosey one (as she liked to call it), threw in the oats but just as she was about to add the milk she seemed to remember Hank saying the elongated one held the heat better so she threw the oats from one bowl to the other, gingerly wiping off the remaining flakes with her fingers and popped the bowl back into the cupboard.

As the porridge was heating up in the microwave, Hank walked in, his eyes not quite open and his hair all flat at the back. Nina wished him a good morning and accompanied the greeting with a big smile. Hank's answering smile came to a halt when his eyes fell on the rotating bowl.

'Is that for me?’ he asked.

'Oh, Hank, for goodness' sake, why does it make such a difference which bowl you use?' Nina said, the fluffy mood she woke up with rapidly draining away.

'It's not such a big deal, you just have to reach out for one bowl instead of the other', said Hank, hand-miming reaching for the bowl, 'What I don't know is why it's so difficult for you to remember? It has a sleepy face on it!'

Nina wasn't going to answer him but it took her longer to put the teabags in the teapot than to lose her resolve, 'Well that's what I thought, I thought, "yes it's definitely the nosey one" but then I remembered you said this one is better for hot things. And the real question is why do you have to have a bowl assigned for every meal? It's just...'

'Yes it's good for hot things but it's not very good for stirring in the honey, isn't it? Now this one...' Hank was holding the correct breakfast bowl in his hands and had spied some oat flakes that where still in it. 'You put it back in the cupboard without washing it!' he accused.

'Yes, I did!' Nina said defiantly.

'How could you...' but the beeping of the microwave signalling that it's done cut him short. They both ran for the microwave but Hank got there first and after a bit of a scuffle he took the bowl out, 'How many cups did you put in?'

'Cups of what?!', Nina was furious now and knew exactly which cups he was referring to, she had no idea that he actually measured how much oats he put in her porridge every morning!

'Cups of fairy dust, cups of oats of course! Measuring cups, or don't you know that we have them?'

'That's it!' shouted Nina, 'you have decided on my New Year's resolution, I'm not going to prepare you breakfast ever again! Thank you for kick starting my year with an argument on bloody fairy cu-, measuring cups!'

'Good enough for me, it's not like I mind making breakfast and I'll make it the way it should be done!'

'Fine!' Nina spat.

'That's settled then.' concluded Hank.

They continued setting the table in silence, porridge, honey, nutella, toast, croissants, orange juice, tea and coffee where all efficiently assembled on the table. Gradually the bang and clatter of cutlery on table top subsided to the normal volume and they sat down to eat. Half way through his porridge bowl (the nosey one) Hank said, 'Happy new year'. His voice was tentative but his eyes were smiling, 'Happy new year' said Nina.

Word count: 759