Laundryroom Small Talk

“All right,” Ann said, as she shook out the sheets for the second time. “You fitted guys, you are the worst offenders. Have you been playing Hide and Go Seek with the socks again? Always, down inside your corners you have something tucked away. What is it this time? Just a pillowcase? That’s not too bad.” In truth, she was disappointed. There were socks and handkerchiefs still to be accounted for, and the sheets were always the most promising place to look.

Ann talked to herself as she worked. It kept the house from seeming so empty. If, now and then, she got an answer, well it kept her smiling.

“Something’s up, as usual, with you socks. I’m going to line you up and see what we’ve got.” As she said this, Ann laid eleven socks in a row. There were six black crew socks, not all with gold toes but still the same length and knit. “Close enough,” she said and rolled them into pairs.

There were two knee highs, the compression kind. “Good not to lose one of you at the price you go for,” she said.

Ann didn’t recognize the next one at all. “Oh wait. Turn you right side out, and you’re an argyle, a lonely argyle. “ She made a tut-tut sound with her tongue. “We’ll have to see about that.”

The rest of the socks were white, but not a one like the others. One was a crew sock, one a knee length crew, one a tube sock and one a shorty.

“Aha! Just as I thought. Something is happening to socks again.” She spoke with a hissing, threatening voice that would have had the socks trembling in their boots, but the boots were at work.

“Wh-where do they go?” spoke up the white shorty. He knew that when he came there’d been a litter of five others like him, and he rarely saw more than one or two.

“Yes, that’s rather a good question, isn’t it?” said the argyle. “My mate doesn’t seem to be around this place today. I’m sure we both came home together, but it was a bit of a hard night, don’t you know?”

“The dryer eats them,” announced a gold toe dramatically.

“Oh, no!” they all squealed.

“There, there. That’s just a rumor,” said Ann. “We’ve never had any proof of it. In fact, I cleaned the dryer vent myself last week, and nothing was in it but lint.” There was a sigh of relief from the shorty.

“I will have to get to the bottom of this,” Ann vowed.

The underpants snickered. “Watch yourself, you whitey tighties, ” Ann told them. Then she folded them and placed them in the dresser drawer. The matched socks went in the next drawer up, and Ann felt around in the corners for spares.

“Sure enough, here’s one of you. Good, it’s another shorty. Now, the rest of you loners, I’m going to put you right here. Maybe your mates will turn up in the next load.”

“That’s what she always says,” whispered one.

“Sometimes it’s true,” said another.

“Yes,” they all concluded, “sometimes it’s true. Sooner or later, they’ll all come home.”

"Some of you could be turned into stuffed monkeys, or dust rags, before that happens though," said an undershirt from the back of the drawer.

"Hush, Tie-Dye!" said an old gold toe. "There's no use to scare them. Let them have some hope."

"At least we're all together," said one little sock.

"That's right," said another. "Besides, I think it might be fun to be a monkey."