February

a short story

2/1

-Right now rain is melting the snow and flooding water into the street. In a few hours the temperature is supposed to drop and begin a two-day snowstorm. People were bumping carts and zipping down the aisles to get groceries before the rain freezes. No one was rude though. This wasn’t like before. This was only supposed to be two days. Not two weeks or two months or two years or forever. Even the cashier had an ER nurse like urgency to her. Its was nice change from the sort of rebellious lackadasais every day workers have been in lately. I bet she wanted to get home too.

-Still no snow day announcement. I just slide the frozen pizza into the oven and have been refreshing my emails every 5 minutes. Looks like the rain is finally morphing. Think I’ll put in a movie and turn my mind off awhile.

2/2

-Its as good as they promised. Might be enough to stretch this into a two day-er.

-This coffee has lit a fire in my belly. Probably a good opportunity to get my clothes off the floor and call the internet company about them raising my monthly. Maybe after I’ll paint or read. Theres freedom in letting your morning buzz goes where it wants.

-After I hung up the phone, I felt my building shake. Through the snow dust I saw the plow in the back alley and some neighbors running out in their sweatpants and snow caps. Last time the asshole plowman buried everyone who didn’t move their car so I ran down too except my tires were already covered so I slid my boot across the snow to make a path. I slid and slid until my foot was frozen but it wasn’t doing much. Luckily my neighbor came out of his garage with a blower and clean swept it away. I never met this guy but I thanked him and said I owed him one. He said his name is Bill and to just come join him for a beer in the garage next time I see him in there. Just as I put my hand on the knob to go back up, I heard the click of a can.

It would have been easy to say its too cold but we’ve all been inside for so long so we sat on stools and talked about how much we hate the plow. Our neighbor Joe came out and slipped on the ice and we all couldn’t help but laugh. Bill turned on the space heater and handed Joe a drink. Its funny. I lived here two years and never said more than hello yet now were throwing darts and wondering why we choose to live in the cold. Guess we have something new to talk about. Tomorrow we can go back to the mundanities of the week but for now I think I’m rather fond of February.

Nigel Van Wieck - Snow Day