Morning all. I hope your week is going swimmingly. Mine feels very rushed. Too much to do and too little time to do it. But at least I am not bored. So there is that. For now let’s jump into this Wednesday morning with a new writing prompt. Timers set for fifteen minutes and off we go.
I think this character has something to work with. I am going to be thinking about this one over lunch for certain.
Wednesday, August 19th: Mice skittered through the walls.
Mice skittered through the walls. He could hear them, especially at night. He knew they were there. He told his landlord. His landlord said that traps were set and they had been eliminated. He had seen no traps and no one around to set them.
‘They could have come when I was out,’ he thought, trying to be generous. He wasn’t certain why he bothered. His landlord usually lied about general maintenance things. If a faucet leaked he assumed it would fix itself somehow. And besides, Hank was the one paying the water bill. If there was air leaking through the windows then it was something he promised to look into but never did, and since Hank paid the electric bill there was no problem.
Hank was fairly handy and what he didn’t know he could generally figure out. He started out by placing a container under the leaky faucet and using the drippings to water his plants while he looked up plumbing related articles and videos. Once he was certain of what he was looking at and reasonably certain why the faucet was leaking, he dismantled it, cleaned the rather disgusting pipes and fixed the broken bit causing the leak. It cost him one of his days off and about ten bucks in materials.
Learning about windows took a little more time and a few more videos but eventually he figured out how to fix them as well. The materials cost a little bit more but he figured that it was offset by the savings on his electric bill, just as the water bill was lowered when the dripping stopped.
When the roof leaked he told his landlord, but had no expectations of getting it fixed. He repaired the small section himself. It was less professionally done than the windows or the plumbing, which he took his time with, but he wasn’t willing to invest in an entirely new roof.
Laying in bed and listening to the mice, he wondered how to get rid of them. He also counted up time. He had two months left on his time here. Could he live with the sound for two more months? He contemplated poisons and traps a he listened to them. He thought about trying to remove the dead ones from wherever they ended up post poison and decided that living with the scent of rotted mouse was worse than the skittering.
He instead made certain that all his food items were transferred to plastic containers the mice couldn’t chew through, not that he kept much in his pantry. The few items he kept in the house generally ended up in he fridge, even if they technically didn’t need to be there. After securing his food, he bought headphones he could fall asleep wearing.
If he didn’t hear the mice, they bothered him less. And if they chewed on vital bits of the house then so be it. He would be gone in two months. The trick worked and he bided his time. The two months rolled around and he gave his notice. His landlord was stunned. Somehow the thought that he would leave had not occurred to him.
It felt good to turn the keys in. All his things were packed and the house as clean as it could be. As he was taught, he left the house in better shape than he found it, even with the mice. But his time waiting was done. It was time to return and do what needed to be done.
Ten til Midnight 