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They looked an unusual couple on their wedding day, as so many couples do – one a tower, one a footstool.  One the protector, one the protected.

 

Every evening dinner was served, one enormous portion that would feed a family, one eating food that would barely sustain a child.  After a hard day’s graft on the building site, a hungry worker needed a substantial meal and it was always provided, always ready.  After all, if you are a professional homemaker this provision was one of the tasks expected of them, their job allocation.  The house was always spick and span and the worker returned to a partner who was always immaculately dressed – in contrast to their state of clothing, the dirt and the dust that had accumulated from the building site.  Nothing a quick shower and change would not remedy.

 

Every evening they sat down to a perfectly prepared dinner being perfectly prepared themselves.  It was a pattern that they had established, a routine.

 

And routines are what define us.

 

In life there are obstacles, setting up a new house, paying the bills.  They coped together as a team, an unusual looking team but if they were different in size, they both played equal roles in their relationship, even though their roles were quite different.

 

*

**

 

One day the pattern was disturbed, and so were they.  This evening, along with the usual dust and dirt from the building site, there were bruises and blood.  It was prejudice that had caused it, caused the bullying.  The water from the usual shower stung over the devastation of skin.

 

They both cried.

 

The next morning determination was the key, an adamant pledge of returning to work.  They ate their breakfast in silence.  For once the dishes were not washed.  Before the big one was aware the small one had slammed the door and was off.

 

*

**

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The small one was meek and timid and always protected.  Today the incense of the cruelty displayed to the one loved had made blood boil.  Confrontation was not the usual demeanour, but today was not usual.

 

Today was full of hate.

 

*

**

 

The gang actually laughed when the ringleader was confronted.  It became apparent that verbal reprimands would not suffice.  It only encouraged them to jeer even more.  So, a fight was challenged by the small one.  The workers erupted with laughter.  The man challenged was at least a foot taller and three stone heavier, but he accepted, wanting to put on a show, if only a brief one, in front of his pals.

 

Incense and protection surged through the veins.  Like the stories of people gaining strength to rescue people, so strength came from nowhere, from inside, from nowhere.

 

It took only one punch from someone who has never placed a punch before but it was a punch of steel and the bully fell backwards, tripped up and stumbled over a timber log and knocked himself out.

 

It was a knockout.

 

The workers gazed incredulously at first and then gazed in admiration.

 

*

**

 

Mary returned.

 

*

**

 

Mary returned to her job on the building site, and became, at last, one of the lads.

 

No-one ever bullied her again.

 

Jack returned home and did the washing up.

 

*

**

Jack Spratt could eat no fat

His wife could eat no lean

 

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