The Duvet

I have heard somewhere that you shouldn't go to bed angry with your partner. Sounds nice, but what if the argument starts in bed?

I don't like quilts on my bed. Not for some aesthetic reason, but because they are hot. Mark loves them. Since the day he moved in here I have had to put up with a heavy quilt on my bed. The problem is that we live in South Florida. It is hot, it is humid, it is sticky, and it is like living in a vaporizer for most of the year. For me to put up with Mark's desire to sleep under fifty pounds of quilted blankets, I have had to crank the air-conditioning to artic temperatures at night. It is both expensive, and it makes those prostate induced trips to the bathroom at night, very chilly. Anyway, when we decided to upgrade to a king sized bed I asked Mark to get something a bit lighter than those big, heavy quilts he prefers.
"Okay, I'll see what I can do.", He said with a twinkle in his eye.
I hate that twinkle. It means he has found an excuse to go shopping. Nothing makes him happier.

The day our king sized bed was delivered Mark pulled out a giant bag from the Home Goods store.
"What's that?" I asked.
"A duvet."
"Duvalier? Papa Doc or Baby Doc?"
"Not Duvalier, duvet. It's a cover for blankets. You can stuff it with either a light blanket, or on cold nights a heavy blanket."
I looked it over, and I was skeptical.
"How do you keep them from moving around in there? Won't they bunch up after awhile?"
With my misgivings brushed aside, we proceeded with great difficulty, to stuff a blanket in the thing and spread it across the bed.
"There, doesn't that look nice?"
Of course I didn't argue with him then, it did look nice. No, the argument started last night, as I tried to cover myself with Mark's precious duvet. I pulled the thing over myself and realized there was nothing in it. I felt around and found the blanket inside all scrunched up on Mark's side of the bed. So I gave it a yank. A hard yank that pulled it off of Mark, leaving him covered only in his tee shirt and little skivvies that he prefers to wear to bed.
"What the hell are you doing?" He screamed.
"I need some covers over here, and you had them all."
"So now you get all of the covers?"
He gave a mighty yank with his skinny little arms, barely moving the covers back to his side.
"Give me the goddamned covers Alan."
"I told you this thing would bunch up. I told you to get a couple of lightweight blankets, but no, you always get exactly what you want."
"Well maybe if you didn't let that gigantic moose dog on the bed, the duvet wouldn't have bunched up."
"You're the one who originally invited Chandler onto the bed when he was a puppy. Don't blame me."
All this of course was said in loud voices. Mark's a very high pitched screaming voice, and mine in just a loud obnoxious voice.

I woke up this morning feeling a bit chilly. Not just because Mark and I ended the evening in a loud argument, but because the duvet was firmly anchored on Mark's side of the bed. All I had was the bed sheet over me, and a gigantic snoring moose dog lying against me.