Congratulations on Renting Cop Out!

There are a lot of ways to tell your wife to go fuck herself. You can say it out loud, or with a card you can make out of a picture of you fucking her sister.

Or you can do what you’re going to do and rent Cop Out for your weekly “Date Night.”

“Are you sure about this?” the pimply faced young man at the video rental shoppe will ask.

You’ll nod grimly and he’ll put the DVD you requested into the case and place the case in a tiny plastic bag before handing it to you and nodding back.

“Okay,” he’ll say.

Your wife will see the case in front of the TV, look at the pint of vanilla ice cream you bought her, and shake her head.

“How did you know?” she’ll ask.

You won’t speak a word. You’ll just pull out the pictures of her next to your brother: exiting his car, holding hands as they walk towards a hotel room door at the edge of the frame, and finally kissing delicately before they enter the hotel room. You’ll hand them to her and watch her eyes plough down, down, down into tears. Then you’ll hug her, but you won’t hug her with your whole body.

“I don’t forgive you yet,” you’ll whisper in her ear.

Her tears will be flowing at this point, but you won’t keep holding her the way you usually do. You’ll just give her a tissue, put on Cop Out and sit down on the couch a little bit away from her.

She’ll glance at you every once in a while, as if she wishes she could turn to you and say “I’m sorry,” but Cop Out will be so awful, so very, very awful, that she won’t be able to. She’ll just sit and weep softly, eventually opening the vanilla ice cream (her least favorite flavor) and taking measly spoonfuls of it into her mouth.

It’ll be as close as you’ve ever come to spousal abuse, and it won’t let up until the end credits roll on Cop Out. When you reflect on events later you’ll know that if you hadn’t been involved in it, if you hadn’t been watching Cop Out too, you wouldn’t have been able to go through with it. But because you did, because you had the fortitude to sit and suffer with her, you know it made a difference: it made her understand how important she was to you.

It made her understand that even though you’re psychologically incapable of harming her you’re willing to fight for her and that she can hurt you with her actions. And that you can make her feel just as bad with your own, as long as you’re involved in them too.

Congratulations on Renting Cop Out!