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Printed from https://www.writing.com/main/books/entry_id/695537-Escaping-the-Cold
by Shaara
Rated: ASR · Book · Fantasy · #1469080
These are some of the many short stories I've written for the Cramp.
#695537 added May 8, 2010 at 12:48am
Restrictions: None
Escaping the Cold
A Writer's Cramp: (1,000 words in 24 hours)

PROMPT:

NEW PROMPT:
It is FREEZING COLD where I live. It hasn't been above freezing in over a week, and most days/nights have brought single digits along with a few mornings of minus temps. BRRR! I'm already sick of winter and it's only January 5!

In honor of my pain, and to give me a few good ideas of how to handle this -- write a STORY or POEM about finding a way to escape winter. The only catch is, you cannot, move/relocate or travel in any way to do it. The "escape" must be accomplished some other way ...


He only wanted to be sweet to his wife. How did it fail so miserably?



Escaping the Cold




My wife, Cailla, started complaining about the cold last September. In October her moaning and groaning escalated, and the misery in her adorable-heart-shaped face began to haunt me. I decided I had to do something about it.

For a scientist, nothing is impossible, not if the principles of physics and a little magic are combined efficiently. I’d studied engineering at MIT. I could take apart and put back together anything faster than a robotic assembler. In fact, I could construct in a new way, a way that completely transformed.

The magic part of such technical wizardry came naturally -- from my mother, my grandmother, and my great-great grandmother, the head Witch of Dustpurr, Plum Drop. I figured I’d dip into Plum Drop’s Wizard’s Recipe Book for Transformal Adaptations, underline a few choice phrases, and then build something.

Leaving Cailla to sit by the heater while her fingers defrosted and her toes tried to wiggle, I headed down to the cellar. It was warm as cocoa with marshmallows down there. No wonder. It’s where I kept my compost heaps. I kept telling Cailla she should mosey on down with me, but she grumbled about the bad odors emanating from my cellar almost as much as she whined about the icicles clinging to her ears.

Downstairs, all warm and cozy, I dusted off my workbench, sending a few mice and several gray and black spiders scurrying. Then I located my hammer and pulled out a couple of boards that were holding an old hose that should have been tossed awhile back. I threw the hose into the garbage can and inspected the boards. Not bad – a few rough spots I’d have to sand down, but at least not full of termites.

The moment I set the wood down on the workbench, I heard my wife’s teeth chattering away. Holy pumpkins! Cailla was a beautiful woman with long chestnut-colored hair that streamed down her back, a cute little button nose just ready to be kissed, and lips that could light up my fire any day. But she sure lacked a native Alaskan’s constitution!

I bent over my boards and started in a cutting, nailing, and piecing together what I’d determined to call a Warm Seat. I whistled a bit, sang a couple of old sea ditties, made sure I chanted the selected magical rhymes, and labored on.

It took me the rest of the day to finish. By then my thumb had turned black and blue from when I’d crushed it. My palm still kept refusing to stop bleeding after it had gotten scratched by a rusty nail. My toe kept throbbing just because I’d dropped the hammer on it a couple of times. But I was finished. That’s all that mattered. I’d be making my Cailla right-pickled happy.

My face glowed with the success of it. I know because the mirror across from me reflected my huge grin and the way my eyes were as proud-shiny as if they’d turned into fog lights. Yep. I’d fixed Cailla’s problem. My wife would never be tormented by the cold again. Never! She’d be so grateful, in fact, she’d throw her arms about me and whisper sweet nothings in my ears.

Knowing that Cailla would not want to come down to the cellar, I picked up my Warm Seat and carried it. Getting it up the staircase was no easy stitch, either. Twice a corner of the contraption hit my funny bone; only thing is – it wasn’t a bit funny. I moaned the first time. The second time I just bit my tongue and dripped blood. What won’t a husband do for his wife?

Anyway, I carted that Warm Seat up to my wife and set it down in front of her.

“Here. I made this for you,” I said.

I thought at first she’d frozen into a solid block of ice, but then she blinked a couple of times. Her teeth weren’t chattering anymore. She wasn’t shivering either. Maybe the worst was over. Still, I picked her up and sat her down on the Warm Seat. .

For the next hour, she didn’t make a sound. About seven o’clock, she commenced to blubbering. I turned about and stared.

“What in carrots is wrong with you now, Cailla?” I asked in frustration.

“I’m so warm I can almost feel my nose again!” she sobbed.

I realized then those were tears of joy she was spouting. I laughed and went to fix us some dinner – cold salami and a chunk of bread. I wrapped her hand about her sandwich and lifted it to her mouth. She nibbled and thanked me.

After feeding her, I took in some TV -- the Rams and the Jackrabbits, our two local teams, were playing hockey down at the community pool. Watching them entertained me as I waited for my wife to complete her thaw. But all that work down in my lab had made me bulldog tired. I yawned loudly, and checked on Cailla again.

“Better now?” I asked.

“Oh, yes, Frank. Thank you. This is heaven.”

She was smiling up at me real grateful like. I kissed her cute little button nose and asked her if she was ready for bed.

“Bed?” she gasped. “I haven’t been this warm for eons. Sorry dear, you’re on your own. I’m not leaving this chair ‘til summertime!”

As I said, I’m a scientist with quite useful magic powers, but unfortunately, I don’t have a single drop of common sense. The only place my wife used to be comfortably warm was in our marriage bed with my arms wrapped around her sweet, plump body.

Since I made the Warm Seat. she refuses to leave it. I can see she’s happy as a cat full of cream, but I’m starting to regret my labors. My bed is awfully lonely each night, and summer is still four months away.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~993 words ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

© Copyright 2010 Shaara (UN: shaara at Writing.Com). All rights reserved.
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