SoulStone
#115: Gone to Pay Rent
quite some distance away
Reggie woke up at the crack of noon. This was early for him. He worked night shift and normally slept much later. He hadn’t slept well at all last night and finally just gave up trying to sleep and just crawled out of bed. He supposed it was the stress from loosing his job. His boss and given him a pink slip as he was walking out the door this morning. Completely out of the blue.
It wasn’t Reggie ’s fault. The company he worked for could no longer afford to continue operating under the new mandatory Federal Health Insurance Regulations, the new EPA regulations, the new OSHA regulations and the new minimum wage regulations. It had been hemorrhaging money for months. New and very expensive, mandates were due to go in effect Monday. What can not continue, doesn’t. So it had closed. The owners were downsizing, automating and moving the operation offshore.
He noticed that Mary was gone. He went into the kitchen to make coffee and saw the note on the coffee maker.
back soon
luv u
So that’s where she’d gone.
The coffee was done. The poured himself a cup then sat down at his computer and scanned his newsfeed. About halfway down he came across something interesting..
“Antarctica melting” He was reading it when Mary walked in. She didn’t look happy.
“I have bad news” She said
“So do I.” he told her.“You first”
“They raised the rent a bunch. The current lease expires Monday. The new lease is triple what the current one is. We don’t have enough money in the checking account to pay three months rent so I told the manager I’d check with you first.” she told him.
“Oh. Well. I don’t have a job any more. It went away. The company closed the doors this morning.” he said. “Want some coffee?”
“Yup...” she sat down.
She asked. “ So now what?”
“We have five days to vacate, counting today.” he said. “It’s way past noon. Nothing we can do before dark. I say we get some liquor, a pizza and have wild and crazy sex until we pass out drunk.”
“Sound like a plan to me.” she grinned. “One thing though.”
“What?” he asked.
“I get to be on top.” she replied. “you’re gaining weight. You’re heavy”.
(next morning)
“Oooh” he said “I have a headache. We haven’t done that kind of drinking in years.”
“Or had that kind of sex either” she handed him a cup of coffee. She’d been awake for hours...surfing the net. “I kinda liked it. You were, shall we say, uninhibited.”
“Coffee!” he gasped “Oh thank you thank you.”
“Ignoring what I said about inhibitions?” she knew him well.
“Certainly” he replied...taking a sip of the nectar of the gods. ”What have you been doing? You got up way early.”
“Thinking mostly” she replied.
“About?” he replied
“TEOTWAWKI”. she said
“ And what might that be?” he asked “do I really want to know?”
“ No you don’t want to know, not really,” she replied “It means ‘The End Of The World As We Know It.”
“ No I didn’t.” he said “that pretty much describes our present situation.”
“Yes it does” she said “I have a crazy idea.”
“Can’t hurt” he said. “lay it on me.”
“ The Skoota” she told her. “It’s time to go sailing.”
The Next Episode will be
#116: They’d had a dream before they were married.
The Previous Episode was
#114: Breakfast of Champions…
the First episode was
#1 : Prologue
I'm
@everittdmickey
.
I write
SPECULATIVE FICTION
I have books on Amazon too.
Sometimes I also comment on the news
Sometimes it's hard to tell fiction from the news.
Good publication brother, continue like this. I will follow you. Greetings from Venezuela
Thank you.
Greeting from Texas.
Texas? Your banner says Oklahoma these days.
Wherever You Are, are you ready for winter to be over yet? I'm not a big fan of winter even though it's incredibly mild here in Southern California. Having a good book to read sure helps pass the time until the sun comes out. Many thanks
BaJa Oklahoma....it's a joke
I'm often the slow kid in class. Thanks for 'splainin' (ROFL better late than never).
I was snowbound in Dallas (Mesquite to be precise) in the winter of 78. Texans handle ice on the road almost as bad as Californians handle rain on the road.
I drove from El Paso to Biloxi MS without stopping and mostly at night when I got stationed at Keesler in late 84. In a clapped out Mazda RX7 that I'd contracted to deliver to a pretty young gal in Atlanta. I know it took more than 10 hours but I think I did it in less than 12.
BO is a big state, which means to me that most of it is too far from the beach.
Cheers
If you went from El Pisso To Biloxi Ms in less than 12 hours you were flying low.... That's damn near 1200 miles.
That's at least a two day trip...more like three..
Ooops, you caught me out. Inaccurately relating the memory and using impressions not facts.
Let me strive to be a little more accurate (for I do value my creedibility)
I was flying low and fast. It was twilight going through El Paso , just pre-dawn in Houston, and the rising sun was blinding me as I passed the state line into LA. I don't remember the details accurately but I did the math at the time (nerd much?) and found I'd averaged just over 80 across Texas. Since you're a trucker you know I had to spend a lot of time in triple digits for that average to be true. Sometimes it surprises me I lived through stuff like that and didn't spend my first night in jail until I was over 45.
I don't remember where I pulled over and slept after that jaunt across Texas. The whole trip was a trip and a good memory.
Thanks,
Rick
PS another detail I just remembered that I don't remember is how much I chainsmoked across the state. All I can remember now is that it was more than half a carton. Heavy sigh, my wife won't let me smoke in the car these days.
PPS going the other way a few years later it was more than 2 days across Texas. But that was in a 35 foot Ryder pulling my clapped out 78 Olds 442 (Olds deserved to die for making that POS and giving it the honorable badge of 442, but that is a rant for a different day). I took my time and took a week to move from Cape Canaveral to Orange County CA when I got out of the service.
Follow me for folback