I think this is one that you either get, or don't.  If you've never seen The Day The Earth Stood Still you probably won't get it.  But then, what sort of person has never seen such a classic film?

(title changedas it appears I spelled it wrong.  Thisa really will blow your Google)

It had been a pig of a week. A bastard of a week. A bastard pig of a week. Working on the customer support desk was not his idea of the perfect job. Far from it. But it paid the bills. It paid better than any of the other jobs he was qualified for. It was just a bastard of a pig of a hell of a job. And this week had been the icing on the cake.

It seemed that every caller had worked themselves into a rage before getting onto the phone. And it was all his fault of course. Never mind that his job was actually to help them, whether they deserved it or not.

So this Friday he had gone down the pub with the others. Why shouldn’t he? He’d earned it. Normally he was a good boy, trotting off home to the missus. All the single guys, hell, even some of the married ones, let off steam every Friday, but not him. She’d have the dinner on the table. And she would have the plans for the weekend all made up, the DIY jobs, the shopping. All mapped out. All planned.

Well, not this Friday. Nope, not this time. He had phoned her up at the end of the shift. No begging, no asking for permission. He wore the trousers, and it was time she was reminded of it.

"I’m down the pub tonight with the lads!" Go on, just try to stop me.

"OK, love. When will you be in?"

When I bloody well want to. "Don’t know."

"OK. I’ll put something together for you to eat when you get back in. I love you."

"Love you"

The whole thing was somehow unsatisfactory. Was this how he made his callers feel? "We’ll replace that free of charge." "No, wait, I want to argue with you."

And so here he was. With the Lads. Giving it some. Chatting up the barmaid. Trading double entendres with the Girls out on the town. Taking the mick out of his mates. Chugging the beers. One of the Lads.

Except he wasn’t really. It didn’t count. Not really, deep down where it matters. The younger lads around him could do what they want, just like he could when he was their age. But not him. Not really. Not now.

Because he knew that every pound he spent here was a pound they couldn’t spend on the house. Because every girl he smiled at would notice the ring on his finger. Because at the end of the night he would be going home to the little woman.

When they had first met he had been fascinated. She wasn’t his sort at all, really. He had teased her about her Trecky friends. He couldn’t understand how she could have a five year plan when he didn’t know what he was going to do next week. He was amazed that she would prefer to spend an evening in front of the telly with him over a party with her mates.

Nor had he ever worked out what it was that she had seen in him. At first he thought she was just dallying with a bit of rough, her with her degree and college friends, and him with his 6 O-levels and drinking mates. Maybe it was at first.

But one thing had led to another. Gradually they stopped going out separately. Till they were no longer individuals, but a couple. His friends and her friends became their friends.

He had asked her to marry him. Not that he needed to. She hadn’t pressured him in any way. But he had asked her because he knew that she would want him to. It had been his idea, but her fault.

And he had studied in his spare time to prove himself to her. He had got his NVQs first time, looked for a better job. Well, a better paying job. So that they could afford to do fun stuff together.

But then the flat started to look small. It was embarrassing to hold some of the elaborate dinner parties she loved so much in the cramped living room / diner. And though she never once made a complaint he had looked in the estate agent windows. Their first house was a fixer-upper, but still the mortgage payments were crippling.

But she had been so thrilled, so happy. She had spent all her spare time until the contracts were exchanged planning exactly how the rooms would be decorated. So Sunday lunchtime in the local had been replaced with lunchtimes in B&Q.

And without noticing the transition, bit by bit, piece by piece, the carefree, aimless free spirit had been sold into a slavery of his own making. He was trapped in a job he hated, paying for a house he hadn’t really wanted, married to a girl from a different world, feeling guilty spending his own money with his own friends.

On the train home he looked at his reflection in the window. Where had he gone? The long hair had been cut and combed. His beard was long gone. The comfortable sweatshirt and jeans had been replaced by shirt, tie and suit. He was a wage slave, chained by his collar and tie. He had lost control of his life. He had lost his freedom. He had lost, and she had won.

By the time he had walked from the station, his black mood had condensed into a hard pit of self-pity and loathing. He didn’t want to be tied down like this. Not yet. He was too young. He had oats to sow. He didn’t want to spend another day talking to arseholes, taking flack for other people’s cock-ups. He wanted to be free to spend his money on… on… stuff. Stuff he wanted, not on mortgages and paint and bloody carpet tiles.

But all the time he was with her, he knew that he could never be free. She would be better off without him anyway. At heart he was a loser, a no-hoper. Everything he had achieved so far was done just because he wanted to please her. He’d never had done it otherwise.

When he walked into the living room she was curled up on the sofa, watching one of her stupid sci-fi films. She looked up, concern on her face.

"Bad day at work?"

He laughed mirthlessly. "Day? Bad fucking week!"

When was the last time he had sworn in front of her? She had never said anything, but he knew she didn’t like him swearing, and so he had lost that part of himself too.

"Aww, poor love. Come here", and she sat up, patting the sofa next to her. "Want to tell me about it?"

He flopped down beside her and shook his head. He just wanted to forget the last week. She put her arm around him and pulled his head down into her lap. He lay there, facing the TV, hand on her knee, as she stroked his hair.

"What’s this?" he asked her, waving at the black and white images on the TV.  Putting off the moment when he would tell her he was leaving.

"The Day the Earth Stood Still. It’s a classic."

He could smell her. This close to her his senses were filled with her scent. How did they do it, he wondered. How is it women smell fresh and feminine at any time of the day, as though they had just come out of a pampering session in the bathroom?

Her fingers worked around the back of his ear. God, that felt good.

On screen a ten feet high man in a robot costume advanced on the classic terrified heroine.

"That has to be the worst robot ever. Ever!" he muttered.

"No, the worst robot ever was the Bertie Basset robot in Doctor Who" she laughed. He had no idea what she was talking about, but he knew that she would be right. He was the football expert, she was the obscure sci-fi expert. Both unassailable in their own fields of expertise.

He stroked her knee. How did women do that, as well? How was it she could make every line, every curve, so touchable, so caressable? She in turn scratched the back of his head, like she might if he were a favourite Labrador. He stretched his neck a little, not enough to make her stop, just enough to let her know he was enjoying it so much. He slid his palm over the hollow inside her knee. He suddenly had an image of them standing face to face, her tight bottom in his hands, her breasts pushing into his chest, her hands around the back of his head, her tongue…

He shouldn’t have drunk so much. He was so tired. If he hadn’t gone to the pub he could have been holding her now. But he knew that he was too tired and too drunk to make good any promise tonight. He patted her knee and tried to distract himself.

The second worst robot ever was standing over the woman. The ominous score was trying to convince the viewer that this wasn’t a guy in a stupid costume, but was in fact Very Scary. His visor started to rise.

"Is he going to zap her?" he asked, eyes closing.

"No dear" she said softly, stroking his hair gently. "He’s a good robot really."

He could hear the woman in the film saying something. It didn’t make sense, but he was too tired to ask what she meant. He didn’t want to say or do anything that would break the mood. He was just so tired, and nestled here in her lap, in his home, was just so perfect.

Just before he slipped into sleep he thought he could hear his wife gently crooning to him.

"Klaatu Barada Nikto"