THREE MEN AND A LADY
Chapter Six

After hours of arguments and many tears from Cal, they had arrived home. Jack had sank, exhausted, into the nearest chair. He wasn’t sure if he would be able to take much more of them.

Cal was mopping the floor, and Fabrizio had gotten out his Legos. He was attempting to build something, but Jack couldn’t figure out what. A few seconds later, he knew what he had been building.

"Ah!" Cal screamed. Jack jerked his head up from the table. Cal had jumped onto the counter and was energetically swinging the broom at Fabrizio. Fabrizio was holding a remote control and staring at Cal with a dazed look.

A cat-like robot was hissing at Cal. It lashed at him with a shiny, metallic claw. Cal screamed again, flailing wildly with the broom. Jack felt his stress headache returning.

"Fabrizio," he said. "Put the robot up."

"But--"

"Do it!" Fabrizio grudgingly went into the living room. "Cal," Jack said gently.

Cal was crouched in a fetal position, shaking slightly. "Is it gone?" His voice was filled with terror.

"Yes. You can get off the cabinet now." Cal hesitated. "I’ll take it apart."

"Okay."

*****

Cal was sleeping on the couch, drool oozing slowly from his mouth. His loud snores echoed in the silent room. The TV glowed soundlessly.

Jack quietly clicked it off. He made his way into the hallway.

"Ow!"

"Fabrizio?"

"Yeah. Why’d you step on me?"

"Because I didn’t expect you to be lying across the hall floor."

"Good point."

"Why are you?"

"I don’t know."

"Okay."

Fabrizio jumped to his feet. "Good night, Jack," he said cheerily, running into the kitchen. Jack wondered if it was safe to go to bed with Fabrizio awake by himself.

In the end, exhaustion won out, and he slowly climbed the stairs to his bed.

Two Hours Later

Fabrizio wanted to make a smoothie, but was having trouble, as it wasn’t coming together properly. He jammed a carrot in the blender. He added an apple, a lemon, and an ear of corn.

Fabrizio pushed the frappe button. The blender came to life with a loud whirring noise. The fruit began to spin, but stopped as if stuck. Fabrizio soon realized that it was not working correctly.

He frantically pushed the off button, but to no avail. It remained stuck, and the noise rose in volume.

Fabrizio shrugged and wandered into the living room. He would fix the blender later.

*****

Jack woke up suddenly, his ears filled with some sort of whirring. What in the hell is that? he thought. Sighing, he got out of bed and walked to the top of the stairs. The sound increased in volume. Jack slowly walked down the stairs. With every step, the sound became louder; when he reached the bottom, it was deafening.

Jack stepped into the kitchen. The blender was spinning on the counter, juice was spewing out of it, and it seemed to have taken on a life of its own. He quickly crossed the room and unplugged it.

"Fabrizio! Cal!" he yelled. They both appeared in the doorway. Fabrizio looked dazed, and Cal was asleep. "Who did this?" he asked. Jack’s eyes had taken on a wild look.

Cal stared at him dumbly. "What?"

"This!" Jack gestured to the walls dripping with juice.

Fabrizio sounded proud. "I did."

"Why?" Jack’s voice was level, but he had taken a less threatening tone when Cal had tried to force them all to participate in group therapy.

"Well, I wanted to make a smoothie, and it got stuck, so I--"

Jack held his hand up to silence him. "I see. That’s not important. What is important is that we get this cleaned up before Rose--"

"Before I what?" They turned and stared in shock. Rose was standing in the kitchen doorway.

"You’re early," Cal said.

Jack looked at him dangerously. "You choose now to be intelligent?"

"Uh…no."

Fabrizio had taken advantage of Jack’s lack of attentiveness to slip out of the kitchen.

Rose walked over to Jack. She touched his chin. "Jack, are you all right?"

"Nope. He’s not." Cal nodded proudly. "He’s been a wreck ever since you left."

Jack opened his mouth to reply, but Rose beat him to it.

"Oh, were you now?" she asked coyly.

"Yeah," Jack said sheepishly.

Rose smiled. "Me, too." She kissed him.

"Oh, Lord, they’re going to start that again," Cal grumbled.

"Of course we are," Jack said happily.

"Jack?"

"Yes?"

"What’s dripping off the walls?"

"I really don’t know."

"Ah…well, can we ignore it?"

Jack raised his eyebrows. "Ignore it?"

"Yeah. We have other things to do."

"Okay." Jack kissed her. He took her hand; they disappeared up the stairs.

Muttering to himself, Cal returned to the couch. Hopefully, he hadn’t missed South Park.

Chapter Seven
Stories