Total pages in book: 74
Estimated words: 73398 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 367(@200wpm)___ 294(@250wpm)___ 245(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 73398 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 367(@200wpm)___ 294(@250wpm)___ 245(@300wpm)
I just shook my head. “I’ll do that in about an hour. I have to finish up a few bills…just try to keep the Wicked Witch of Hostel away from me while I do that.”
June gave me a single thumb up and closed the door, and I yanked my shirt up and over my head, fisting the collar at my neck as I did. Once it was off, I tossed it in the direction of the chair but missed.
The next thing to go were my dirty pants, followed shortly by my socks.
I left the underwear on since they were the single item of clothing I was wearing that hadn’t been doused in gasoline when the line had broken earlier and splattered me.
Once I was redressed, I left the clothes on the floor where they’d fallen and sat back down in my chair, sans socks or shoes.
My eyes caught on the envelope as soon as I sat down, and I tore it open carelessly.
Had I known what was inside, I would’ve been a lot more careful about how I’d handled it.
As it was, I’d already torn the corner of the eight by ten piece of paper in my haste to get it open.
Once I unfolded it, my heart stopped.
Then I burst out laughing.
It was a short comic strip, just three scenes, but the amount of detail in each was astounding.
It took up about a third of the paper, and luckily the tear was small, and not through the comic itself.
The first comic was of a man on a motorcycle, pointing his finger at a woman who was saying, “Why don’t they play poker in the jungle?”
The next scene was of the man rubbing his chin, looking deep in thought. The bubble above his head said, “I don’t know, why?”
The third scene was of the woman, a huge smile on her face, throwing her hands in the air. “Too many cheetahs!”
My grin was stretched so wide that my face was hurting.
I flipped the note over, trying to find the author’s signature, but there wasn’t one or even a name anywhere.
It was just the comic and that was it.
I found myself disappointed.
For some reason, I really, really needed to know who’d sent it to me.
That was the first person to make me smile in quite a while, and I felt like I needed to thank them.
That task was nearly impossible lately, thanks to my ex-wife.
Grabbing a tack off my desk, I went to pin it to the wall but stopped short when I saw the old frame on the bookshelf with my degree in it.
It would hold up better if I had it in there. Despite my best intentions to keep the place clean, this was still a salvage yard. Papers got dirty whether I wanted them to or not, and sometimes my cleaning lady wasn’t nearly as careful as she should be.
Decision made, I put the comic into the diploma frame, in front of my diploma, and replaced it on the wall where I’d intended for the comic to sit—right behind my desk where I’d be able to see it the moment I walked into my office.
After one more last glance at the comic, I decided to question June on who’d given it to her.
I made it to the door, but before I could open it to ask June anything, I heard the shrill sound of my ex’s voice and changed my mind.
I also locked my office door for good measure and went a step further by turning off the light.
Then I went back to my desk, turned on the flashlight on my phone, and worked in the dark as I wrote checks and paid bills online.
It was another thirty minutes before June knocked on the door and said loudly, “She’s gone!”
I licked the last envelope and stood, dropping it onto the pile on my desk where the rest of the outgoing mail lay.
Then I cursed and went back for the socks and boots, slipping both hastily on my feet.
I emerged moments later to find three women smiling at me.
“What?” I rasped, my voice a little rougher sounding than it normally was.
I was probably getting sick.
Great.
It never failed. Every single time I got a cold, I’d lose my voice.
“Your ex-wife is a crazy bitch,” Janie supplied.
I snorted. “Tell me something I don’t know.”
“She threatened to call the cops because we wouldn’t leave. Apparently, she’s still under the false impression that she has every right to be here,” June continued.
I groaned. “She would. What’s hers is hers, and what was mine was hers. Even if we divorced, and I was allowed to keep my place of business because her daddy made me.”
Janie snickered. “After what I just endured for you, you have to crush two cars.”
I gave her an assessing stare. “I’ll do this…but just know that it takes more time than you think it does.”