Staycation by RJ Clark

Author:RJ Clark [RJ Clark]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: M4L Publishing
Published: 2023-05-11T00:00:00+00:00

35

Summertime, and the Living’s Not Easy

“I’m hot,” the young boy whined.

“I am, too.” The power had only been off for fifteen minutes at most, and the house already felt twenty degrees warmer. It hadn’t gotten that hot so quickly, but she knew it would soon enough if the power didn’t come back on. The small drip of sweat down her back had turned into a flowing river. She felt sticky all over. Every stitch of clothing hugged and squeezed her slick skin. “Why don’t you take a shower?”

“But, Mommmyyy! I’m hot! Why would I take a shower if I’m hot?”

“A cold shower, dummy.”

“A cold shower? Why would anyone wanna take a cold shower?”

She knew of a few reasons. At school, leering boys would sometimes joke about needing a cold shower after “Double-D Debbie” jiggled down the hall. And while she wasn’t entirely sure why they needed a cold shower, she assumed it had something to do with the things between their legs that magically sprung to life in Debbie’s presence. “To cool yourself down, silly.”

“Oh. Yeah.” The young boy giggled.

“Go on and try it. I bet you’ll like it.”

“Okay. But, Mommy?”

“Yes?”

“I’ll be back,” The Boy said in a robotic, lifeless voice and then disappeared up the stairs.

The bathroom door slammed shut, followed by the sound of the shower faucet turning on. Have to make it quick. Pick up the phone and call Grandma Miller before he gets back. I don’t know how long he’ll last in the shower.

She held the receiver to her ear and tapped the hook switch several times until she heard the hum of a dial tone in her ear. There was a steady tone, and then five fast tones, followed by a steady tone again. Messages. There were messages. She stared at the keypad. It had been so long since they had any messages to retrieve that she couldn’t remember the password.

1-1-1-1? No.

0-0-0-0? No.

6-9-6-9? No.

1-2-3-4. Bingo, she was in.

The electronic attendant said, “Hello. Your mailbox is full. You have… twenty-nine new messages… and… six saved messages. Main menu. Press one to hear new messages. Press two to hear saved messages. Or press pound to exit the system.”

She pressed one.

“First new message. ‘Hey, yeah, Bill. Todd Rudledge here. Just wanted to see if you’ve given any more thought to switching to BX Health. The coverage looks comparable, and the rates are competitive. Anyway, give me a call when you’re back from vacation. Bye now.’”

Press one to replay message. Press two to save message. Press three to erase message. Press four to skip to the next new message. Or press pound to exit to the main menu.

She nervously pressed two. He might want to hear the message later when the game was over. “Message saved.”

“Next new message. ‘Denise, hiiiiiiiiii. It’s Joanne. Joanne Garriga from next door. I know you’re on vacation, but I wasn’t sure if we were supposed to collect your mail. Mr. Buchanan says it’s piling up over there. I can hold it, no problem. I guess if you hear this, just give me a buzz, okay? Okay.

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