In everyone’s life, there comes a
Turningpoint
by Meghan Elizabeth Brunner
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Gadget looked up from her book, slightly annoyed. Faucet’s leaking again, she thought with a sigh. Seems like I just fixed that. But she didn’t get up.
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“I suppose I should do something about that,” she said to no one in particular -- mostly because there wasn’t anyone around to hear her. And hadn’t been in over a year.
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It echoed unnaturally in her huge, empty home. Emphasis on empty. Especially when such a small sound seemed so loud.
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She let her head fall back to rest against the back of the couch. And closed her eyes.
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It echoed in her head. She talked to herself, more to hear a voice than out of interest for anything she had to say. How long had it been since she’d heard someone else’s voice?
“I mean, a leaky faucet like that... wastes water, even as little as a drop to a mouse, that can add up after a while. Why, in a year, taking into account the times I’d turn on the faucet to actually use it -”
she tried to wrap her brain around the numbers, figure out how much water would be wasted in a year. And just couldn’t bring herself to care. She sighed again.
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“It’s the thing to do,” she reminded herself, “when you’re a Responsable Adult, to fix your faucet when it gets leaky.” The stirring appeal to her sense of duty had absolutely no effect.
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“I might go insane, listening to it. Somebody’d find me, just sitting on the couch, loopy as a wing nut, talking to myself.”
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“If anyone ever came by to find me, that is. Besides salesmen.”
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“If nothing else, it would give me something to do for ten minutes or so.”
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“Besides sitting here waiting to find out if Nostradamus was right, that is.”
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“I mean, I really don’t know what’s wrong with me, just sitting here when I could get up and fix the faucet. It’s really not like me to so lack motivation that I’d ignore something as important as that.”
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“Maybe I could redesign the plumbing. That’d keep me busy for a couple days. Or so. Maybe.”
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“There are drawbacks to having a mindbashingly high I.Q.”
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“I am... so bored.”
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“Boredboredboredbored. Yupyup, that’s me. Gadget Bored Hackwrench. Sitting here, listening to water drip.”
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She tried reciting the periodic chart in time to the drips and gave up after the first two rows or so. Just didn’t seem quite as entertaining as it once had -- now that she could do it backwards and in her sleep.
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“I’ve already read this book three times. I don’t know who I’m kidding -- it still ends the same, with me sitting on the couch, bored, staring at this book on the coffee table, listening to the water drip.”
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“What I need is adventure. A break in the routine. Maybe I’ll have lunch in the morning and breakfast in the evening, and just for variety put supper somewhere around mid-day.”
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“I could go traveling. See the world. The Screaming Eagle looks kind of lonely up there.”
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“Except it wouldn’t be any fun without someone along to share it with.” That actually brought a twinge, and a slight sniffle. She blinked back tears.
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“What I need is something unique to do. I could go, rescue people, change the world!”
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“Or.... I could just sit here and listen to my faucet.”
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“I wish Monty’d come visit.” Silly, she knew -- she hadn’t seen him in.... long time. If she closed her eyes and pretended real hard, she thought she could hear his great, rolling laugh, feel her father’s beloved touch gently brush hair back from her face, hear a soft voice whisper, “Cheer up, bluebird, you won’t be alone forever,” like it did in her dreams.
She shook off fancy -- it was too much to hope.
*plink. plink. plink. plink. sproing.*
Sproing?
The salesmen traps!
Something to do!
With a delighted grin -- teach those salesmen to interrupt her peace and quiet! -- she dashed to the front hall -- the traps were flying fast and furious now. It would take forever to reset them all -- well, at least the rest of the afternoon. Gadget was overjoyed. She pulled her goggles into position and fastened on a helmet as she climbed into another product of her boredom: an odd vehicle with a spherical reinforced aluminum casing and moving appendages that went every which way. A small red light began flashing -- the last net over the cheese had fallen. Impressive. No one had made it that far yet. She activated the opening mechanism for the microwave door and coaxed the clanking, whirring machine out of its lair. Out of curiosity she gazed at her captives -- two chipmunks, unknown, and -
“Monterey Jack?” she whispered in a hushed sense of awe and delight -- he still looked almost exactly like the mouse in her father’s scrapbook.
Things might be interesting today, after all...