This is the third excerpt from my novel, The Shattered Vase, which is scheduled to be published very soon. So excited!

The Shattered Vase – 3

Before Joe left for work, he pulled the pillow away and whispered
in her ear. “You need to take our wedding picture down from the
wall. I shot a buck. When I get the mount back, it’s going to be right
where our wedding picture was.”
What the hell?!! Who on earth has a buck’s head in their bedroom?
What has happened to my husband?
Joe was the one who had insisted that they place their wedding
picture above their bed. He had tenderly said to her, “I never want to
forget how beautiful you are.”
Now this dead animal was going to be there?
Several months passed. Suzie hoped that Joe had forgotten about
the dead deer. She was about to hang the wedding picture back up
when Joe announced that the mount would be coming home.
It was a monstrosity and a bit hard for him to hang on the wall.
First, he had a difficult time finding a stud, and then he couldn’t figure
out how to anchor the base to the wall.
He stepped into the hallway and phoned the taxidermist to ask his
advice. When he came back into the bedroom, he didn’t remember
where the stud was, much less the stud finder. He wrenched the bed
from the wall, looking for the stud finder behind the bed. After moving
the bed, crawling behind it, and hitting his head on the frame,
he looked up and found the device in plain view on his nightstand.
Suzie watched with a sense of amusement. She tried to engage
him in conversation, asking him what she supposed were idiotic
questions about hunting deer.
Joe was curt and rude in his replies.
“So, you have no problem with shooting a defenseless animal?”
Suzie asked.
“Suzie, I’m doing the deer population a favor. Without hunters,
the numbers would grow to such an extent they would die off from
natural causes.”
“Somehow I think the deer going up on our wall may have a
different philosophy.” Suzie bent down to pick up a sock. “I wonder
what the children will think.”