And what did the robin do then...?

The Robin poked his head around the barn door to check on the exact whereabouts of his wife.  Mrs. Robin had her back to him and was viciously chopping away at a worm, which was, not unsurprisingly, taking umbrage at this turn of events and was arranging for various parts of itself to escape in all directions.
“It’s bitter out!”  He announced, stamping his feet and pushing the door to behind him.
There was no response from his other half, who continued her chopping and marshalling of various worm sections.  However, the hunched shoulders and absolute silence did not bode well, he thought.
“Absolutely bloody freezing out there” He tried again.
“Did you get anything?” She finally responded, without turning around.
“Nah, nothing doing” The Robin opened his newspaper and turned to the Sports pages, “Earth’s hard as iron” He added.
“Hmph!” It was only a little sound, but there was a sense of trouble to come.
“Water’s like a stone!” The Robin continued, conversationally.
“Hmph!” Again, more vicious chopping.
“Wouldn’t surprise me if we didn’t have snow”
His wife’s tensed shoulders, shrugged.
The Robin flicked a page, checked Bristol City’s results and tutted.
“I know one thing,” The Robin continued, “that North wind doth blow, right enough”
“What?”  His wife spun around and glared at him, chopper dripping on the stone floor.  The Robin jumped a foot in the air but tried to look unconcerned.
“I was saying, about the wind” He explained, with a nonchalance he definitely wasn’t feeling, “it’s from the North and erm, it doth blow”
“Doth?”
“Yeah” The Robin shifted uncomfortably in his seat, “doth”
“What’s that, when it’s at home?” She folded her wings and tapped her foot.
“Well, it’s poetic innit?” The Robin was feeling unaccountably warm, “Means ‘does’ dunnit?”
“Then why not say, ‘does’ eh?” The glare hardened, “Unless, of course, you’re trying out a lisp?”
“A lithp?  I mean, a lisp?  With this beak?” The Robin looked shocked, “Why would I want a lisp?”
“To make yourself look cute for that little wren you’ve been flirting with” His wife raised an interrogatory eyebrow.
“Wren?  What wren?” The Robin realised he was sweating, despite the winter chill.
“Don’t give me ‘what wren’” She snarled, “you know very well, what wren”
“Oh, that wren” The Robin nodded, “her that flits in and out of the bushes down the garden, that’s who you’re on about it, isn’t it?”
His wife just stared.
“There’s nothing going on!” The Robin insisted, flapping his wings a little, “Strewth, we’re not even the same species!”
“Never stopped you before” His wife growled, “you can’t keep it in your feathers, you”
“We’re just on nodding terms, you know?” The Robin insisted, “When I’m out there, providing, you bump into people, don’t you?”
“Providing?” His wife screamed, “Since when have you been ‘providing’, eh?  Were you up at the crack of dawn getting this worm, eh, were you?” She gestured toward their dinner, part of which was attempting to sidle away.
“I’d had a late night” The Robin grumbled.
“Playing cards and drinking ‘til all hours with your mates” She made the word sound despicable, “It comes to something, I say, it comes to something when the only time you join the Dawn Chorus is when you stagger in, half-cut, from the night before!”
“You have to be sociable” The Robin pleaded, “birds of a feather and all that”
“Well, you know where you and your lot can flock to, don’t you?” His wife said, grimly.
“There’s no need to be like that” The Robin grumbled, “you can’t blame me for being out of a night, when it’s as cold as charity in here?  I had to put me head under me own wing, last night, just to stop me ears from freezing solid”
“Poor thing!” His wife snarled, “Just as well, ‘cause your wing is the only place your head’s going to go, last night or any ruddy night!”
“You’re upset, I can see that…” The Robin began, in the hope of placating her.
“Upset?  You think this is ‘upset’?  You don’t know the half of it, sunshine” Mrs. Robin stomped back to her workplace.  What was left of the worm froze in mid-slither.
“Anyway, I’ve not just been wasting me time” The Robin attempted to regain the initiative, “I’ve been doing something constructive” He smirked.
“That’ll make a change!”
“I reckon…” He said, puffing himself up, “I reckon, if I play my cards right, I could finish up on a Christmas Card”
“You could finish up in a Christmas Box if I have owt to do with it” His wife muttered.
“Could be the making of us” The Robin said, proudly.
“Us?  Us?  Where do I come into it, then?” Mrs. Robin put down her chopper and turned to look at him, wings on hips.  The worm, or what was left of it, made another escape attempt.
“Well, all right, not ‘us’ exactly” The Robin admitted, “More me, to be honest, but it all reflects well on you, dunnit?”
“I don’t need anything reflecting on me, thanks very much” Mrs. Robin said, firmly, “I’m well-respected around here, I’ll have you know.  Which is more than I can say for you!”
“Anyway…” The Robin butted in, trying to change the direction of the conversation, “I’ve been doing a bit of posing on spade handles, bird baths, stuff like that”
“Posin’!” Mrs. Robin spat.
“There’s an artist…” The Robin began again.
“You’re a ruddy artist, that’s what everybody ‘round here says” Mrs. Robin seethed.
“As I was saying, there’s an artist, couple of gardens away, I know he’s done pictures of badgers and other stuff what have been in his garden.  I mean, badgers!  They’re black and white ain’t they?  What he needs is a spot of colour, to be specific, and to whit…”
“You’ll never pass for an owl, you know”
“To whit…”He tried again, puffing himself up, “a robin redbreast!”
“Anyone told him, this artist?” His wife asked.
“Well, that’s a bit tricky, innit” The Robin squirmed, “I can hardly go and have a word, now, can I?  Hence the posing!”
“Just you, was it?”
“You what?” The Robin looked puzzled.
“Just you, on this shovel or whatever it was.  Not you and…ooh, I don’t know…a wren, perhaps?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about” The Robin snapped.
“Look good that, on a Christmas Card.  Just the thing the punters want, a nice picture of a robin and a wren, beak to beak, as it were?”
“Well, I dunno…” The Robin shrugged, “I s’pose.  But, it’s not happening, is it,  ‘cause it was just me doing the posing”
“So, nothing like, for example” She dived into the dark recesses of the barn, and came back with a tattered bit of cardboard in her beak, “thig!” She managed, with a beakful of Christmas Card.
The Robin stared, horrified, at a now scruffy but unmistakable, painting of a robin and a wren, standing on a bough, more or less beak to beak.
“Ah!” He managed, at last.  He swallowed hard.  He considered his options.  Finally, he said, “I’ll get me coat, shall I?”
“I would, if I were you” Mrs. Robin turned on her heel and went back to chopping.
“’Course, I don’t know what I’ll do then…” He raised both wings and looked over his shoulder, in the hope of a glimpse of some sympathy.
“My heart goes out to you!” Mrs. Robin said, sarcastically, “Shut the door on your way out”
The Robin stomped out into the bitterly cold wind.  He shoved his newspaper under his wing.  He took absolutely no satisfaction from noting that he had been right and it had been snowing.  He took a determined step forward, vanishing immediately into a snow drift.  Coughing and spluttering, he hauled himself out.  
‘Ok,’ He thought, ‘Things may not be going so great, I’m homeless, it’s snowing and there’s an icy wind belting right up my tail feathers.  But, look at it another way, I may be down but I’m not out!    I’m on the front of a Christmas Card, I’m famous!”
He took a deep, albeit icy, breath.  Puffed up his fine, red breast, and took another determined step forward, vanishing, once again, up to his beak in snow.
‘Bugger!’ He thought, as he climbed out, with difficulty, ‘If this is what bob-bob-bobbing’s all about, you can stuff it!’
In a nearby bush, a wren sang, loud and clear.
‘Well, I suppose that’s something” He thought as he listened to the pretty song. Filling the icy air with joy, He took another step forward, and then stopped, abruptly, ‘Hang on a minute, isn’t it the male of the species that has the finest song?’  He scowled at the wren and yelled, “I’ve always had me doubts about you!” Whereupon the wren gave a “chit” of disapproval and vanished back into her, or as he now had to concede, possibly his, bush.
He weighed up his options.  On the one hand, he could stride purposefully out across the lawn and show his wife exactly what he thought of her.  On the other, he was freezing his doo-dahs off here and she probably wouldn’t be looking, anyway.  He chose the path of least resistance, and snow, and sneaked back, through some rotten wood, so that he was now underneath the floor of ‘his’ barn.
‘I don’t know’ He thought, bitterly, ‘if this is what fame and fortune are all about…werl!’ He shrugged, shook himself to remove the remaining snow and put his head under his wing.  ‘All in all’ He thought, ‘I’m well and truly tucked!’

Merry Christmas!