Magic of Sudden Pain

It was one of those tranquil evenings where a man can sit in his favorite chair, digesting his supper in peace, when suddenly, from down the hall, came the voice of my beloved wife—shrill as a tea kettle and twice as alarming.

“Do you ever get a sharp pain that shoots across your body, like someone’s got a voodoo doll of you and they’re stabbing it?” she inquired, as though she were conducting a scientific survey on the matter.

I pondered for a moment, then replied with the honesty and brevity of a man who wishes to avoid further interrogation. “No,” I said.

There was a pause, a dreadful pause. The kind that makes a man wonder if he has miscalculated something vital.

Then, with the speed and precision of a thunderclap, came her follow-up, “How about now?”

And, let me tell you, I have never been more convinced that some unseen hand had driven a pin straight through my very soul.