When Metaphors Go On Strike
Flipping over the last steak on the BBQ, Annie called tiredly from the backyard, "Kids, get out here and eat." The kids were glued to the Nintendo due to a recent crafts accident, and couldn't come running like they usually did. She called the carpenter because she knew he was good with glue. Even so, it took them an hour to detach the kids, and by then the steaks were cold. When the carpenter bent own to free Joseph, Annie wiped off the dried white chunks from around Lisa's nose and gave her a scalding look. She didn't want Joey to get sucked into that world as well. He was only four.
She hoped for more cooperation from Greg, here oldest. He was now 14. However, the problem was, he was stuck on this neighbor girl named Sally. It was his age, you know. They looked like a pair of Siamese twins, the backs fused together. Annie suspected Sally's mother, Susan, and the sewing accident' in making Greg and Sally's Halloween costumes was a bit of a stretch.
Aside from all this, Annie, a single, but young and attractive mom, was stuck on Hank. She sometimes wished that were true in a physical rather than a figurative sense - times like now, when he was being so helpful with the glue, and she got to work side by side with him. But mostly she liked the idea of him, and would sit up nights contemplating him. That was the glue that held her life together. Running off with a carpenter named Hank, that would set the town talking. He with his big saw, her working the glue gun. Her children could play in the sawdust and Hank could build her a little hut to lock Lisa in when her nose started twitching.
"Hank, you'll be needing some pie after all that hard work," she said, and took his dirty plate inside. He told her that was affirmative.
"Greg, sounds like some pies coming. Want some?" Greg said yes.
"Sally?"
As she was pointed away from them, her answer was unintelligible.
"Greg, I expect Sally to look at me when she's talking to me!" With an exasperated sigh, Greg shuffled around. Like the sad/happy face of the theater, Sally's beaming smile came into view.
"When's my mommy coming?" she asked cheerfully.
"As soon as she can, sweetie. She has to get through all the traffic and get home before you and Greg can go over to your house."
Greg frowned, "No she's not, she's just inside getting us more pie. She'll be back any minute, Sal, don't worry."
Hank looked confused, sometimes he couldn't tell what was real and what wasn't. Ever since his brother had come into his room with a wood chip stuck on his shoulder, he had been getting confused. He had tried to talk to Sally about it, but she had told him to take a chill pill. After anxiously searching the freezer for medicine, he'd had to give up, and have an apple again. "An apple a day..." he mused, as he glanced at the headline which read "No end in sight to metaphors strike!"
