Part VII: Time Warp 2000’s – Cut! #17 (Chapter 119)
You probably think I have done something awful with the rest of the matches – like burning my house down.
But this is life, my life.
In the mornings, as I lie in bed, I imagine kicking the covers
back, sitting up, dropping my feet to the floor, standing up and stretching,
showering, dressing, shaking my hair out, nibbling on toast, brushing and
flossing my teeth, packing valuables into the car (it gets complicated here
because I don’t know how to tell what is valuable anymore), throwing on my
coat, checking the mail (For what? I already lost the Publisher’s Clearinghouse
Sweeps ‒ why
bother sending in that other entry, the one with Ed McMahon’s picture?),
looking for my purse, getting my keys and glasses, getting the gas can,
starting the car, pulling into the filling station, filling the gas can, going
back home, pouring the gas all around the house, finding the matches ‒
Ah, the matches.
Shel found the matches.
I caught him snooping through my underwear drawer.
“Where’s that little lacy number I bought you?”
Before I could tell him that I was wearing them, he said,
“What are these doing here?” Shel shook the box and walked over to me. “You
want to set a fire?”
“Why not?”
My husband laughed, dropped the box ‒ match
sticks spilling all over our quilt ‒ and
pushed me onto the bed. He fell on top of me and slid his hand down my jeans
and onto Victoria’s Secret.
“Yes!” he said as we battled among the sticks.
Afterwards, Shel picked up the matches and locked them up in
his safe.
Date: Wed, 10 Jan 2001 19:35:31 -0700 (PDT)
From: 😣 Samantha
Mallory <sam@artworky.com>
Subject: Message received
To: ch@Vipst.com
Candy,
Rest assured that Henry
made his delivery in a timely manner – New Year’s Eve, in fact.
He shouldn’t get fired
because of me, although, I must admit, he was a little scary –
Not at all what I would
expect of a delivery person.
I’m stunned.
I had no idea, not even a
clue, although my 10-year-old granddaughter had warned me that very morning
that I had a doppelganger. How she knew, I’ll never know.
My head is still swirling.
Do you mind if we don’t
meet until I have some time to sort things out?
Samantha A. Mallory