him and her

A woman should soften but not weaken a man.
--Sigmund Freud

they must have been in their thirties, they must have been husband and wife. while i was watching them, i felt i was watching a soap opera on tv...

she looked deadly, he looked harmless. she was noisy, he was silent. she was hitting him -- his face, his chest, his arms; he received her slaps and blows calmly. he flinched once or twice but that was all he did. he never tried to dodge nor to ward off her blows. he did not try to calm her. he did not try to keep some distance between them either. he stayed by her side as she shouted at him and hit him hard some more -- he seemed to be her all-enduring, breathing, yielding punching bag.

no, it wasn't a shooting for some teleserye or movie -- it was real and it happened in a very public place. it was a disturbing sight and the people around them were the ones embarrassed for them -- i was one of those people. although i tried not to take a second look, i wasn't really that successful. she was creating such a ruckus, it was impossible not to notice and be curious of what was going on between him and her.

see, the scene was far from cute. it was clear that she was not hitting him in a playful manner. she was hitting him with the intention to hurt, and he simply received the slaps and blows coming from her... like a strangled helpless puppy.

"weird people," was what i thought as i moved away from the scene.

i don't know why she had to be furious with him. we can only guess, right? whatever the reason, the show was distasteful. for that, i think they deserved to be berated -- her, for the public display of violence, and him, for his apparent lack of self-respect and self-preservation. i'm not saying he should have hit her back -- oh no, oh no! but he should have at least done something.

anyway, i don't know how it all ended... who knows? maybe he did hit her back after all. erkkk!