Marcia argued less

"I wish she argued less."

The stranger smiled, and Eric felt a spike of fear. Something wasn't right, but he couldn't stop talking.

"Everything has to be a fight. Any little issue gets blown up into a battle. Even when there are no issues, she'll find something to fight about and I'm tired of it. I wish that she was able to deal with things some other way."

Suddenly, the stranger was right in front of Eric, their face taking up nearly his entire vision. The face that had looked so familiar before now barely looked human. Their smile was too wide, the eyes too hungry. Eric suddenly felt like he was very far from his apartment, very far from any appearance of society or safety. He was nowhere, and there was nothing else there except for this... thing.

Finally, after forever and no time at all, it said "Done," and kissed him.

Marcia walked aimlessly through the park, trying and failing to think of anything except Eric. The walk was supposed to calm her down, but all she was doing was re-living every moment from the date and stocking ammunition for their next argument.

After working herself up about Eric telling her that she wasn't eating mozzarella sticks the "proper" way, Marcia felt something in the air change. She looked to her left and saw... a window? That didn't make any sense, she was...

She was back in the restaurant. She must have zoned out for a minute while looking outside. She looked back at Eric, who looked annoyed. Right, the mozzarella sticks, she thought, internally rolling her eyes. She opened her mouth to tell Eric what she thought of his "proper" way, but a waiter approached the table and she turned her ire towards them instead. "What do you want?"

"I am very sorry that everything did not go as you'd hoped," the waiter said smoothly. "We'd like to try again, so please tell us what went wrong. There was an issue with the mozzarella sticks?"

Marcia rolled her eyes for real this time. "The issue wasn't with the food," she said as she glared at Eric. "The issue was that he was telling me I was eating them wrong."

The waiter looked at her, confused. "But you were," he said.

Marcia's glare shifted to the waiter and doubled in intensity. "And how would you know that? You weren't watching us, were you?"

The waiter appeared unbothered. "I was not, but Eric said you were eating them wrong, so you must have been. Eric is always right."

Something in the waiter's voice made Marcia shiver. "I... What?"

"Eric is always right," the waiter repeated. Marcia shivered again at their words. It felt good. It felt right. It felt...

I need to stop this, something's wrong. "That's not... he can be..." Marcia was suddenly having trouble finding the words to disagree. She started to panic and went to stand up.

Eric leaned in and said, "You should really listen to the waiter, Marcia. He's telling the truth."

The waiter is telling the truth, Marcia repeated in her mind. Eric wouldn't lie to me about that, right? She sat back down and looked at the waiter, listening intently.

The waiter continued, "Eric is always right."

"Eric is always right," Marcia found herself echoing.

"So if Eric says something that you disagree with?"

Marcia thought about it for a moment. "Then I must be wrong."

The waiter leaned in and whispered, "Good girl."

With a start, Marcia woke up on the park bench when her phone buzzed. She looked down and saw it was a text from Eric.

"Hey. It's getting late, you should come home."

He's right, I should go home, she thought. He's always right. She shivered slightly at that thought as she started walking towards their apartment.