Ecstatic

Cindy stomped around the foyer, her eyes surrounded by red rings, her blonde hair a wild bird’s nest, her cheeks quivering, her sobs echoing up the stone hallway.

“I caught you red-handed, you little cretin. Miss Pringelhoeffer, your nephew’s a low-class son-of-a-bitch. He’s been screwing this guy behind my back for months. Get rid of him … I wish I’d never met you, Aaron Aardvark.”

“Aaron, take care of this at once,” Aunt Wilhelmina said, her cheeks pressing into her mouth, her eyes cast down, and her index fingers quivering. “This is not suitable conversation for the servants to hear.”

“I’ve had enough,” Aaron said. He wanted to project an even tone – like a lawyer waiting for a widow to sign over her pension. On the dotted line, and then leave, please. “I’m taking you back to the Haight. Right now.”

But Aaron had a better idea. “Come with me, Cindy.”

“The sooner I get away from you, narcissistic homo, the better.”

Cindy bolted for the door down to the garage. Aaron followed her down the stairs and into the garage. She reached for the Bentley’s door handle.

“No,” Aaron said, keeping the even tone. “Not that car. The one over there in the corner –“

She rolled her eyes and marched over to the time machine. “What the hell kind of contraption is this?”

“It’s a dune buggy,” Aaron said. “I’m going to Stinson after I get rid of you.”

“Bet it’s to go screw that whore boyfriend of yours.”

“Enough, Cindy, get in the car.”

Thirty minutes later, he’d dumped her in Essen 1056, right in the middle of the Middle Ages. That’d teach her to squeal on him to Aunt Wilhelmina. I mean, his aunt was his trustee. She could pull the plug on his allowance at any time. He headed back to San Francisco 2013.

“Jeffrey, dude” Aaron called, his voicing rising into a tenor vibrato. “How’d you like to hang out at Stinson today? That’d be awesome, buddy.”