Possible Beginning of a short story

Brad Standish is a fat, stupid man in the sense that he is chronically overweight and possesses an IQ slightly, though comfortably below the national average. His wife, Yolanda, an Ecuadorian dancer, thinks he should join a gym or do more crossword puzzles. Or maybe Sudoku. "Fuck Sudoku," Brad says to himself, if only because the word sounds foreign and needlessly complicated to him.

Recently, Brad has developed the ability to completely ignore Yolanda while still giving her a sense of superiority and control over the relationship. "I joined Gold's Gym for a bit," he says, "but the cost cut into our date money too much for my liking." Yolanda loves their bi-monthly dates, not because she enjoys Brad's company but because she has an insatiable lust for Chilis Bloomin' Onion and has no real income of her own. Brad's frugality in other facets of their relationship has built up a gradual pile of resentment in Yolanda that now sits in the middle of their marriage like elephant dung. Brad continues the dates to keep Yolanda's passive-aggressive scorn from blossoming into full-fledged aggressive-aggression.

In the grand scheme of things, Brad is comfortable with the moderate amount of antagonism in his marriage if only because he doesn't know any better. In fact, if you knew Brad you would probably conclude that he doesn't deserve any better. But I don't know you, so I don't want to alienate you by making incorrect assumptions about your thoughts and feelings. Let's just agree that Brad may not lead the sweet life but there are far worse places he could be. Des Moines, Iowa.

Brad doesn't necessarily regret marrying Yolanda to get her into the country but he doesn't feel especially magnanimous anymore either. And frankly, if Yolanda were as unhappy as she often intimated, she would leave. "It's a free country, anyway," Brad would say. No, there is nothing horrible going on here. On a scale from 1 to Miserable, Brad and Yolanda squat down right around a six, easily in the middle quintile of American marriages, happiness-wise.

If Brad were a mere 10% smarter he would probably have the wherewithal to lament his situation and ask himself at night if he weren't dying a little inside each day. "I am stagnant," he would say if he were quite more neurotic. But in his present incarnation Brad is only cognizant enough to be glad that he isn't in prison, like his brother Duff. From the monthly letters he receives from Duff, Brad has gleaned that prison pretty much, in Duff's words, sucks balls. So, Brad walks the straight and narrow, happy(ish) to be unincarcerated and still a solid leap from mental retardation.