by Jeff Dvorak
brittleness from the cold sent his foot through the vinyl straps to the ground below, bringing him down violently, with his crotch straddling the front of the chair. In most cases, cold can be used as a numbing agent, but there wasn’t enough ice in the world to cover the sensation that was currently coursing through Jack’s body. He fell backwards, landing in the snow. As he fell, his foot snagged in the hole from the chair and it followed him to the ground, landing on top of him.
As he lay there cupping his manhood, he knew time was not a friend of his and he only stayed down until he was able to function. It would be a long time until the pain would subside completely and he would feel normal again. Once he was able to move, he gingerly removed his leg from the chair and got to his feet. He placed the chair back in its previous position, checking the firmness once again. This time, he stayed with the sturdy metal of the chair instead of the vinyl which was his undoing. He stepped onto the front of the chair, which a minute earlier had so cruelly tried to rob him of his ability to have children, and he stepped onto the arms of the chair.
He gave his feet a little wiggle and the chair held its ground. It was only a small victory but he offered up a little smile in triumph. He now stood about a head and a half above the bottom of the window and he could see Bruiser sitting there patiently, watching what he was going to do next. He placed both hands flat against the window and started at working it free. It took a couple minutes but he was finally able to slide it back and gain entry. As soon as it gave way, Bruiser got up and bolted for the other room.
He wasn’t high enough above the window to just climb in, so once he got it completely opened, he jumped for the opening. Being only five foot seven, basketball was never his strong suit, nor was the jumping that came with it, so his effort was only met with moderate success. He got high enough for his arms to get over the sill and he was holding onto the side of the house by his armpits.
He looked down below him, and in his zeal to make a strong jump, he pushed off the chair, which sent it toppling over. He hung there, contemplating his options, of which there were few. If he dropped back down to the ground, he risked breaking something, and if he wasn’t careful, he could land awkwardly on the chair and really do some damage; so his only choice was up and in the house.
The walls were made of rough stucco and with his bare feet would cause a bit of damage, but he had no choice. He tried to lift up the lower half of his body as much as he could and he planted his feet as firmly as possible against the outer wall. Once he thought he couldn’t do any better, he pushed with his legs to propel him upward. Immediately, the wall began to dig into his feet, but he gave it no mind and pushed ahead. He was able to get just high enough to tumble into the bedroom, doing a somersault through the window and landing on his back. He lay there for just a few seconds to compose himself, stood up, closed the window and went in search of his loving dog Bruiser.
--
The soles of his feet and toes were slightly bleeding, but not too bad; they would stop on their own. He walked towards the kitchen, looking at the rows of poo prints as he did, only to find Bruiser sitting patiently in front of his food and water dish which were both empty from the day before. Food was not currently on the agenda, so he grabbed Bruiser by the collar, lifting him off his feet, and proceeded to carry him back to through the bedroom to the master bath.
He needed to take a shower, so deciding to kill two birds with one stone; Bruiser would shower with him. He took off Bruiser’s collar, his own clothes and opened the door to the shower. It was a standalone shower with two glass walls in the corner of the bathroom. He closed the door, set Bruiser down on the floor and reached for the water.
Just like everything else in his house, the shower was temperamental too. Another item to put on his mental list of things to fix. There was some sort of blockage in the shower head and sometimes water would not stream forth and sometimes it was only a small stream, which he just lived with. This morning, as he turned on the water, nothing happened.
It was one of those small shower heads for environmentally conscious people with the little dowel like piece that slides back and forth to turn the water on or off. He was sure that was where the problem was and he should have replaced the nozzle a long time ago. He reached up and fiddled with the piece and nothing happened. He tried twisting the nozzle, moving it around and a couple other things which in the past had been successful, but not today. He reached down and turned both the hot water to full blast and the cold water to full blast and stood back to see if the increased water pressure could force through the blockage.
He looked down at Bruiser and gave a shrug, Bruiser looked back up at him and seemed to be doing the same thing and they both stood there waiting. He could hear the pipe shaking behind the drywall and a slight rattling came along with it. Finally, the pressure built up enough that the shower head shot off the pipe as if it were shot out of a gun and struck Jack square in the forehead.
He went down like a sack of what Bruiser had left on the back deck and he was out cold, the open pipe raining water down on him and Bruiser. Coming to, unlike when he first woke up that day, alert and ready for action, this time he was dazed and groggy. The water coming down blurred his vision and he had no idea how long he had been out. Sitting in the corner he spotted Bruiser, soaking wet and not looking happy at all. He reached up to rub his forehead and quickly recoiled at the pain. Gingerly reaching up again, the knot on his head appeared to be the size of a golf ball but there didn’t appear to be any blood. Thank God for little favors.
He slowly got to his feet and was a little unsteady as he leaned against the back wall of the shower. He was out at least long enough to use up all the hot water and what he was left with was an ice cold shower for him and his dog.
He picked up Bruiser and proceeded to clean him first. Brown, muddy water came forth from Bruiser’s hair and found its way down the drain. Once he was certain that Bruiser was clean and there was no poo left to be found, he set him down and showered himself. By that point, he could barely feel the cold of the water.
He turned off both the hot and cold knobs, leaving the bare pipe exposed and the nozzle sitting in the corner, he’d deal with it later, and exited the shower, drying both himself and Bruiser as best he could. He put Bruiser’s collar back on and carried him back to the kitchen. He bypassed the food and water, unfortunately, there wasn’t time, and he put Bruiser in the half bath. That would be his home for the day. He said good-bye, closed the door and went in search of his clothes for his presentation.
--
Jack had been working on his presentation all week. He knew it was nothing vital to the company; he wasn’t stupid. It was a chance for him to either succeed or fail and he had every intention of knocking it out of the park. He knew he was getting older and the time to act like a kid was quickly fading. If he didn’t rise to this challenge, he might not get another chance.
He worked on it tirelessly, even bringing it home with him to make sure it was the best it could be. He was prepared for the challenge and, in truth, it wasn’t even the promotion that mattered most. It was the chance to show people who he really was. It was the chance to change the course of his ship with one turn of the wheel. As he looked down at his watch, he still had an hour until the presentation. All he needed was to get dressed and get to work without any more problems.
As he walked down the hall, he was finally feeling confident because he had done something right. A few days earlier he made sure his only set of nice clothes were cleaned and laid out for him. His wardrobe consisted of mostly jeans, shorts and T-shirts and he only owned one nice pair of pants, a blue button down shirt and a tie his parents bought him to wear at his college graduation. Jack also wasn’t very adept with the washer and dryer, so most of what little clothes he owned sat dirty, in a pile, in his closet. He planned for this, though, and finally, his planning was going to pay off.
He went into the bedroom and although the smell was faint, he knew right away what it was.
In the commotion since he first woke up, he had barely been in the room which is why he didn’t notice it earlier, but as he walked over to his laid out clothes, he finally saw the problem.
Vomit and lots of it. The last memory he had was getting into the passenger seat of his car while his friend Carl drove him home. From the time he got into the car to the time the newspaper jolted him awake was a blur. Clearly, though, part of that lost time was spent throwing up on his only set of nice clothes.
Partially digested food, bile and liquor had all crusted together through the night, coating his clothes in a hard shell that would probably take at least three washings to dispose of the evidence. It was time he didn’t have and he quickly moved to the closet to see what else he could scrounge up.
Scrounge up was the correct term because as he opened the door, almost everything he owned was in a mound on the floor and the smell emanating from the pile was only a step or two better than the smell he just left. He knew he had clothes for the day and after his success getting those clothes ready, he had planned to spend the evening washing everything else. He quickly realized it was something else he
