A storm

“Norbert,” Karl said, swallowing his impatience and putting on a surface smile, “bring the deck chairs inside. And be quick about it. We haven’t got all day.”

Karl hammered the final nails in the plywood box he’d been putting together for the garden window. He’d planned on doing it some day, but had never thought they’d need it so soon after moving into their dream house by the ocean.

“Now come over here, Norbert,” he said. In the five minutes since he’d instructed his lazy partner to bring in the deck chairs, he’d taken in two. “And help me hoist this box up to the window.”

The two of them lifted it onto the ladder Karl had set up by the window. “Ouch, oh my God, holy crap!” Norbert said, dropping his side right onto the ladder. The other side slipped out of Karl’s grip and collapsed onto the pavement. The screws popped out of two sides and the wood panels came undone.

“Look what you’ve done!” Karl said. “You’ve set us back two hours. The way we’re going, the storm will have crossed Florida into the Gulf before we even get this up.”

“Oh, this hurts so bad,” Norbert said, heading toward the kitchen door. “I got two splinters in my thumb. I can’t believe it, and just after the manicure at Terry’s.”

What a complete lunatic he lived with. It served Karl right, he thought, for staying with him here in Delray Beach – and buying this house for half a million, against his better judgment. He could hear the voices of those little men on his right shoulder, issuing their “told you sos” even as the voices of the little men on the left said, “all part of living, all part of living.”

Norbert watched the Weather Channel while he sucked his thumb. “Turns out, sweetheart,” he said, “storm’s turned north and is heading up to North Carolina. We’re in the clear.”

“Oh, no we’re not, Norbert.”