In response to chelsie-anon's prompt: She was due any moment & Charles Carson wanted everything to be perfect. He dusted & vacuumed the sitting room, changed the sheets on the bed & all that was left was to clean the kitchen. He'd mastered the art of clearing away & stacking the new fangled appliance but he'd only ever watched as she poured the crystals into the cup. He searched high & low but all he could find was the liquid soap, it was for dishes too, he thought & leaned down to fill the cup to the very brim…what happens next?
E.M. Hughes is happy to see her house in the distance. A lovely Edwardian with a nice garden; she has quite the green thumb and her husband helps, at least that is what he calls it. She has been in America two weeks this time and every time that she is away and with each passing year, she curses the effects of jet lag more and more. She's not old, but too old for this, she thinks. But the American audiences love you, her publisher tells her time and time again. He says the same thing about the French, the Canadians, the Dutch, the Germans, and every other market in which her books sell. With each new book, Robert Crawley ramrods her into another press tour filled with endless interviews by well-meaning journalists who ask the same questions year after year.
She sits making polite banter on daytime talk shows with hosts who clearly haven't read her books. She knows because they cannot pronounce the names of the characters correctly and confuse the plot points but she plasters on a nice smile and gently corrects them. They are more interested in which lip colour she wears, or who styles her hair, or which designer she is wearing. Her latest, a sprawling drama set at a large country house, is a massive hit both sides of the Atlantic. Chronicling the lives of the wealthy and privileged Callingwood family and their servants. There is talk of turning this one into a movie or mini-series but she isn't sure if she has it in her to manage it. Robert arranges a myriad of dinners with distributors who fawn all over her; tell her that this one is her best yet. She doubts it, but will take the compliment anyway.
She feels ashamed to complain really. Her books sell well; have made her famous (sometimes too famous) and have provided for her very well. It was at a book signing that she met him. The man who awaits her at home. Sometimes he comes with her and those are the most pleasurable of trips. They always arrange to sneak out of a party; she feigns a headache and they make a hasty retreat to the lift, his fingers already searching out the door key from his wallet. She manages to keep the charade up in the lift, down the corridor to their room, and until they enter their room. She manages until he kicks the door shut behind them and feels his breath on her neck and him unfastening the zipper of her dress.
This was not one of those trips however and she is happy to be home. Sometimes she feels as if they are the clichéd ships that pass in the night. But then they've always been she thinks. In the old days they phoned, she longed to hear his voice at the end of a particularly trying day. Now, they Skype; he protested at first but finally gave in after she convinced him and taught him how. Even when she is home, he sometimes travels to broadcast wherever whatever sport he is covering is happening or it is his turn at the late news shift. She wonders how on earth they managed to fit in a child. A child. Charlie is nineteen and living across town in an apartment with two other chaps with whom he attends university. She talks with him twice a week and sees him when he is out of clean clothes or wants a home cooked meal. They insist that he have breakfast with them once a month and dinner twice a month. Three weeks ago, he brought a girl to dinner. She doesn't know if it is serious or not. It is a mystery that she cannot solve. Yet.
She shoves the door shut behind her and drops her keys into the dish that sits on the table near the door. She props her suitcase against the wall nearby and thumbs through the post that has piled up on the table. He never handles the bills, she does their accounts; he says that he is rubbish at numbers. She doesn't believe it for one minute. Any man who can recall cricket, football, and lacrosse statistics for the past thirty years from memory cannot possibly be rubbish at numbers. She plops the post back on the table and calls out to him.
"The weary traveler is home," she calls dramatically as she toes off her shoes.
"I'm just here," he calls from the kitchen. She smells the aromas of a lovely supper and a smile crosses her face. "Why don't you slip into a bath and get comfortable while I finish up," he says peeking his head around the corner. "Welcome home, Elsie."
"I've missed you," she confides. She is rewarded with wink and his signature lopsided grin.
After a nice bath, she slips into the new gown he's left lying across the bed for her. A sapphire blue, silky thing that she thinks is much too young for her but since he doesn't she slips it on and likes the way it feels, the way it hugs her body. She slides on the matching dressing gown; he's chosen well, the fabric falls exactly as it should. She hopes that he will be pleased. She knows him well and is curious, lifts the duvet slightly. He's changed the sheets; silk there too. Black. She smiles. She's missed him and he has definitely missed her.
As she makes her way to the dining room, she notices that the house is spotless; everything is in its place, the floors recently vacuumed. She's somewhat astonished. He hates the thing; says its noise is an affront to the senses. She tries to use it when he is out of the house and hopes that the thing is still in one piece.
She finds the table exactingly set; a holdover from his mother, a lovely but demanding woman who refused to sit down to an unpresentable table. Standards, she said, must be upheld at all times. Adeline Carson, herself a writer, became famous for a massive tome on manners and etiquette. Elsie runs a finger along the edge of the table and takes in the food, the candles, everything that her husband has done.
"Charles, where are you?" she inquires
"I, ah, just sit down and I will be out in a minute," he replies, sounding a little winded.
Elsie's brows knit in concern. Normally, Charles would be waiting for her, waiting to pull her chair away from the table, to pour her wine. Something had to wrong. "Is something wrong, love?" she asks.
"Ah, no," he manages sounding quite unconvincing. "I'll be right out. Just have a seat and pour yourself a glass of wine." Well, she is convinced that something is amiss. As she pushes open the door that separates the dining room from the kitchen, she stops cold in her tracks. Her mouth falls open in the most unladylike fashion.
"What on earth?" she lets out before she can stop herself. She tries in vain to suppress a smile as she finds her husband kneeling on the floor of their kitchen with soap bubbles surrounding him.
He looks up to her panic stricken and embarrassed. She cannot help herself as a throaty, dirty laugh erupts from her. "I don't think that it is funny," he fumes, his ears turning bright red from anger and mortification.
"Oh, I beg to differ dear. It is very funny," Elsie replies with unadulterated glee. After what seems to Charles like minutes of agonizing laughter (which in reality is only seconds), Elsie takes sympathy on the man and offers her hand to him. "Come on, we'll clean it up together."
Elsie reaches into the cupboard, retrieves the olive oil, and measures out some in a cup. She pushes it toward Charles and tells him to pour it into the dishwasher. He looks at her skeptically. "Go on, I dare you," she says.
"Oil in a dishwasher?"
"Dish soap in a dishwasher?" She shakes her head at him in mock indignation. "It will break down the bubbles," she promises. "Now close the door and run the wash cycle." Of course, he complies. He always does; knows that she is right (most of the time; when she is wrong, he doesn't let her forget it - until she stares him down).
They mop up the remaining bubbles and while the dishwasher runs its course they enjoy their dinner. Charles has done well with dinner; what does it hurt if he accepted help with the difficult bit from their old friend (and caterer) Beryl Mason? What Elsie doesn't know won't hurt her, he thinks. She compliments his cooking; he beams proudly. She'll never let him know that she called Beryl and asked her to check in on him. What he doesn't know won't hurt him, she thinks. They talk of Charlie and the girl he brought to dinner a few weeks ago; whether they are serious or not. Charles doubts it; the boy is only nineteen. It must be love then, Elsie laughs. They discuss her publicity tour and the success of the new book, the prospect of it being turned into a movie or mini-series. He asks her who she thinks should play the stuffy butler. She says that if she were casting she might choose someone substantial, tall, broad, a deep voice, not unlike him. She sees a smile cross his lips and his eyebrows dance. And the housekeeper, she asks him. Oh, she's definitely Scottish; lovely, kind, someone with a little fire, not unlike her. Someone who can keep the butler in line. She blushes at his suggestion.
After they've finished, Charles is interested to see if Elsie's little trick with the dishwasher has worked. They clear the table and make their way into the kitchen. Charles can barely contain himself and makes a production of opening the dishwasher door.
"On the count of three," he announces. "One, two, three….." He flings the door open and peers inside the machine. A smile tugs at his lips.
"Well?" she says.
"Well. You could knock me over with a feather," he replies. "I wonder. How did you know that trick, Elsie?" The dishwasher is completely devoid of any and all soap bubbles and Charles Carson is completely astonished.
Elsie draws herself up to her fullest height, such that it is, and in the most imperious tone she can muster "Well, I am afraid that you will have to continue to wonder, love."
No matter how much Charles Carson tried, and he did try that night, to coax Elsie's secret from her, a team of wild horses would never drag it out of Elsie Carson that she too had once done the same thing.
Just a bit of silliness. If you are inclined let me know what you think. Also, you can Google this and it is an actual method of clearing dish detergent from a dishwasher.