It's Still Life

Unsolved

“I’m home,” she calls to her husband upstairs, “I’ll just put the groceries away.”

Milk in the door, grapes in the drawer, eggs top shelf….

Next morning, the warm scent of coffee’s brewing, sunlight slicing through the kitchen blinds. She puts a frying pan on the stove to warm, opens the fridge door, and reaches for the eggs.

The carton is empty. No shells. No mess. Just 12 hollow indentations.

Music spills softly from the radio as she looks through the kitchen window: on the patio chair is a clucking hen nesting on a mound of straw — brooding 12 eggs