This Is the Life by Alex Shearer

Author:Alex Shearer
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Atria Books

16

Free Lunch

To get on the Internet, it was necessary to tie a dongle to the end of a bamboo pole and stick it out of the window, for otherwise the reception was none too good. Louis showed me how to do it.

“Louis, why don’t you just get cable broadband?”

“It’s pricey.”

“Louis, it isn’t, not really. And think of the convenience. You wouldn’t have to tie a dongle to a bamboo pole and then wave it around outside the window looking for a hotspot.”

“It’s no good anyway—we’re screwed.”

“Louis, it’s a small problem easily fixed.”

“I’m going to lie down.”

So he went to bed. Getting cured is an exhausting business. And hospitals are no places for sick and vulnerable people. And everybody knows that, but no one has devised an alternative.

After some heavy persuading, I got Louis and his debit card to go to the appliance warehouse.

“I still don’t see why I need a new washing machine.”

“Louis, it doesn’t work. It’s twenty-five years old and it sticks on each cycle. It doesn’t wash clothes, it massacres them. You put pullovers in there and they come out as balls of wool.”

“And the fridge isn’t that bad.”

“It’s got diseases in it. And it’s rusting through.”

“It’s lasted this long.”

“Well, it’s come to the end of its useful existence.”

That was a mistake, saying that.

“Anyway,” I hurriedly added, “let’s go and look at them.”

Louis chose a fridge/freezer as near as possible in shape and form to the one he had already.

“I want a top-loader washing machine, like the old one.”

The salesman did a deal since Louis was buying two items and threw in free delivery and the removal of the old fridge and old washing machine.

I noticed there was an offer with the washer.

“Louis—you see this? You get a year’s supply of detergent, free, when you buy this one.”

“How much is a year’s supply?”

“Says twenty-five pounds.”

He looked at me awhile, as if doing slow but accurate mental calculations.

“That’s more like twenty years.”

“Well, if you can eke it out that long, so much the better.”

So Louis managed to recollect his PIN and he tapped it in and delivery was promised for Saturday, and so we left.

The machines arrived as promised, but no detergent.

I called the store and queried this.

“No, you need to apply online,” the salesman said. “Go on the manufacturer’s website and there’s a form there. Just put in the serial number and date of purchase and they’ll send it to you.”

I got the dongle and tied it to the bamboo pole.

“What are you doing?”

“Fishing for the Internet, Louis. What do you think?”

“No detergent then?” he said, with a kind of complacency and a grim-edged satisfaction—the satisfaction of one who has prophesied the worst and has seen it come to pass.

“I’m just going to fill the form in online and it’ll be on its way.”

“You know your trouble—you’re too gullible,” Louis said. “Credulous and gullible.”

“Louis, it’s a bona fide offer.”

“There’s no such thing as a free lunch.”

“It’s not a free lunch, Louis, it’s free detergent. A year’s worth.”

“We’ll never see it.

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