It looked like a simple butcher’s knife. It did, it really did. It had the same blank metal gleam of those knives butchers use to hack away at slaughtered animals’ flesh. It had the same fine, sharp edge that quickly drew blood. It had the basic black handle that most knives have.

But lying on my coffee table, it seemed to be a species apart from those cutting blades seen in meat stores. I don’t know why. Perhaps it was the background. I mean, my polished mahogany coffee table is very different from the blood-stained counter in the butcher’s shop. It is, it really is.

I picked up the outcast of knives, smiling slowly at the dull silver sheen that covered the blade like a blanket.

“Sweetie!” my mother shrilled, her grating voice causing me to drop the knife. It thudded on the ground, the suburban oatmeal-coloured carpet masking the sharp thump. “Sweetie, where are you?”

“In the living room,” I replied. I hid the knife under a large couch cushion, and flicked on the television set. Canned laughter from a vapid sitcom blared back at me. Ugh.

“Hi sweetie,” my mother said, entering the room. Her eyes lit up when she saw the ditzy blond and the hunky dope chatter on the screen. “Oh, I love this episode! It’s so funny! Don’t you love this show, sweetie?”

I smiled blandly, every inch the typical suburbian who doesn’t have a knife stashed away under their couch pillow. “Of course! It’s my favourite!”

My mother beamed back at me. “Great. Now, sweetie, I have to go out, so would you mind washing the dishes for me?”

My mother? Going out? How rare. “Sure.”

“Thank you, sweetie. You’re a lifesaver!” My mother kissed me on the cheek, her cold pearls brushing against my flushed skin.

“No problem.”

“Bye, sweetie! Have fun!” My mother hurried out the door, her heels sinking into the plush oatmeal carpet.

“Bye.”

Alone again, I unearthed the knife, but left the sitcom on. In the flickering world of TV, the controlling neat freak was sucking face with the sarcastic loser.

The knife. Such a useful tool. I gazed at it adoringly, admiring the metallic luster that reflected a blurred, distorted version of me. From sacrificing bleating goats to perfecting the tanned bodies of Hollywood starlets – like the nose of the pretty fashion guru on the screen – the knife is incredibly valuable.

“Show me the power,” I whisper, as nerdy as the television dino prof lecturing his class in a phony British accent. I pick up the sharp blade and sliced. A thin scarlet stream dribbled across my forearm and careened over my wrist, splatting messily on the floor. Oops.

I stopped after that, and pressed a forgotten towel across my wound. There was a suspicious reddish stain on the Carpet of Suburbia, but my mother would probably think she had knocked over a glass of Merlot while doing some heavy petting with her stud of the week on the couch. Rrrr.

It had looked like a simple butcher’s knife, but it isn’t. With that, I carried the knife to the kitchen, and began to wash the dishes.