A Cup of Tea
Every morning Ellen woke up and had a cup of tea, before having breakfast and starting the day. Usually Fred would sleep late and not come down until she was ready to leave for work. Today was different.
Fred had woken up well before her and was nowhere to be seen when she woke up. She called out his name, but he did not respond. Yet she definitely heard movement coming from the downstairs kitchen. This concerned her.
Throwing on a bathrobe, she silently went downstairs and peaked into the kitchen. Fred was there, fully dressed and working on something by the teapot. His back was to her and his body shielded what he was doing. What was he planning?
Ellen quietly went back up stairs, quickly put on her clothes and then went back downstairs. This time she made sure to make enough noise so Fred would know she would appear soon.
As she entered the kitchen. Fred was standing by the counter holding a cup of tea in his hands. He walked over to where she usually sat at the kitchen table and placed the cup of tea there.
“I’m surprised to see you up so early,” she said.
“What?” he replied, “Can’t someone get up early and make tea for one’s adorable wife once in a while.”
The answer would have been yes, but he’d never done that. Not only that, there was a strange look in his eyes, one that she had never seen before. Something was definitely amiss.
“I don’t see why not,” she said, “How nice of you. But I wasn’t planning on having tea this morning. I need to go to work early.”
“You can’t go to work without at least one sip of tea. It’ll help you through the day,” he said rather abruptly in a louder tone of voice than usual.
Now she was really worried. “Since you went through all that trouble, I’ll have some, but only if you join me. Here let me make a cup of tea for you.”
As she went to the teapot to prepare another cup of tea, she couldn’t help but not notice there was not a tea infuser in the sink, nor any teabags. Clearly whatever was in that cup he made for her was not tea.
She found the tea infuser and placed some tea in it. She asked Fred to check if the tea in her cup was still hot enough. As he turned to check she added a few ingredients of her own into the infuser for his cup.
When the tea was made, they both sat down to drink. Fred, not suspecting anything was wrong, drank first. Before she could even touch her cup, Fred was out cold. It was then that she saw the note sticking out of his pocket. It was a suicide note and it was signed with her name.
Attempted murder is a crime. And so is murder, but only if you’re caught. It was not hard to sign the note with his name, after all it was in his handwriting.
