This is a short story I wrote a while ago and I thought I’d share:
-Bridget’s Mom-
Bridget sat at the kitchen table and stared at the wall. She could never get through to her mother. Mabey it was her eighty-two years that made her so stubborn. Mabey it was just in her personality. Or mabey it was both. Bridget’s mother walked into the kitchen from the living room, holding a magazine.
“What color dress should I get?”
“I really like the light blue one, but that’s beside the point. Mom…a woman of your age has no business getting married..”
“Fine. If you want to be that way, consider your invitation null and void.” Her mother walked back out of the kitchen as quick as she had come in.
Bridget tried to rationalize the marriage of an eighty-two year old woman and a ninety-three year old man who met only 4 months before. She couldn’t do it. Her mom had been a widow for thirty-five years, and suddenly now she was going to get married. She worried about her mother’s money being the reason for the marriage, but Tom wasn’t the most mentally competent man in the world, which was another reason why she couldn’t understand why her mother would want to get married at this point in her life. Especially to him.
The next morning as soon as Bridget rolled out of bed, the phone rang.
“Hello?”
“Hi, Dear. I want you to come over and have breakfast with me. There’s something I need to talk about with you.”
“Okay. I’ll be there in a minute, Mom.”
“Okay, Sweetheart. I love you.”
“Love you, too.”
“Bye.”
“Bye, bye.” She hung up the phone.
Bridget suspected her mom was going to show her the dress, or exclaim that she was going on a honeymoon to Paris, or something equally outlandish, but instead when she got there she saw her mom sitting at the table with two plates of gorgeous food, waiting for her to join her.
“Hi, Honey.”
“Ooh…Mom, what’s that?”
“I just thought my only daughter would like to have a nice breakfast with her mother.”
Bridget smiled and then sat down to eat.
“These eggs are good.”
“Thank you. I want to talk to you about something.”
“So I gathered.”
“I want you to know that I didn’t mean it when I said you couldn’t come to my wedding.”
“I know that, Mom.”
“Honey, I also know you are really upset with this whole thing.”
“Yes, Mom, I am.”
Her mom looked into her eyes.
“But I am a grown woman and in these last few years of living I want to get to know life again, I want to have them be as full as possible.”
“Mom, I just worry..”
Her mom cut her off, “Honey, I know you worry, but I promise, you won’t have to worry anymore.”
She grabbed a gun that was sitting on her lap and shot Bridget five times in the head.
Tom came out of the food pantry and said, “Nice job.”
They eloped that same day, and she wore the light blue dress.