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We had to have three elements... It had to be in a kitchen.... It had to take place 'round midnight.... and there had to be stress without once using the word stress.... It's a part of a story so keep that in mind....
Chucky George and the Verba’s Hamburger
If you looked close enough, up in the corner, over by the Frigidaire, you could see the start of the crack in the ceiling that jig jagged along until it was lost in the space above the double cabinet where the glasses were kept. Not the good ones, because this particular cabinet was precariously hung against the house lean, but the glasses they used regular so if that half crocked cabinet happened to collapse, there would be no real harm done, just a big old mess to clean up. Now if you happened to look up at that crack at just the right moment, you might catch an eyeball or two peering down from the floor of the closet in the added-on room where the other side of the crack ended up. That room above was made out of wood while the rest of the house was brick so it looked haphazard, as pretty much everything did in that house, only more so. But since it was put-up before they moved in, Evie couldn’t blame that one on Chucky. Still, it was good that both the sagging kitchen and the ill advised wood-sided second story “junk” room were attached to the rear of the house so no one but the backyard neighbors could see and that didn’t matter much to Evie “‘cause they were just some Hungarians right off of the boat.”
Tonight was a special night. Tonight it was officially summertime since it was the first Friday after school let out and that meant one thing; hamburgers at midnight. Verba hamburgers brought home in a sack when Chucky finally made his way back to the house for the weekend after his last second shift of the week. Chucky George had been telling his little brother Stevie for weeks all about them hamburgers from Verba’s and how good they were and how great it was that their daddy was going to wake them both up just to eat hamburgers out of a sack in the middle of the night. Last year, Stevie was just a kid so he was too young. But this year, his Kindergarten year, Stevie was old enough to get himself a tap on the back. to rouse him up and get his very own Verba Hamburger to eat right from the sack.
The boys were giggle happy, taking turns looking down into the kitchen to see if their daddy was home yet. But that didn’t last all that long since they had expended a whole lot of energy being excited about the Verba Hamburgers and so first Stevie nodded off on the floor of the closet in the “junk” room and then Chucky George sidled up to his little brother and he too drifted off to sleep.
It wasn’t until Evie was done with her Friday night sewing and mending and started into banging around in the kitchen that the boys were woke up. Now that had to be around 11:30 or so, a long while yet before Chucky came home, but the boys didn’t care; it was way after dark and that’s all they were concerned about. Evie was all worked up, upset really, about something as she was making a lot of racket and mumbling as she opened and shut and opened again that cabinet, the one the boys weren’t ever suppose to get into.
Chucky George put his ear down to the crack to try and catch what she was saying.
“Fuckin’ ass hole.” She muttered.
Suddenly Chucky George’s ears were on fire. He was use to daddy saying the “F” word but his Mom? But this sure didn’t stop the boy from peering down and then listening in some more.
“He’s got them boys all worked up over some fuckin’ hamburgers like they was the filet mignon or something.” Evie flailed out her arms, spinning the brown whiskey bottle she had grabbed out of the forbidden cabinet about the room as she opened up the Frigidaire and grabbed another bottle. “And then he comes saw shayin’ in here all tipsy….”
She slammed the door of the Frigidaire shut with a fierce nudge from her hip and stopped talking to herself long enough to pour out into a tall glass half from the brown whiskey bottle and half from the bottle of refrigerated whiskey sour mix.
It was a strong whiskey sour.
She stirred it up with her finger and took a long quick slug at the drink, made a face, took another which finished it off, whipped her mouth with the back of her hand just like she told the boys not to and got right back into making herself a second whiskey sour.
“Fucking beer breath ass hole.”
Evie repeated the process but this time, nursed that second whiskey sour. It took her three, four gulps before she started in to making the third one.
“All day long I’m here, stop that Chucky George, you get outa that Stevie,” pointing around the kitchen at imaginary dangers as she tried to convince herself that she needed an escape valve just as much as Chucky claimed he did. “Stop stop stop and then he comes stumblin’ through that fuckin’ door like some god damn hamburger hero.” She paused for a second to stop the weaving and then finished her out loud thought “And there you have it…”
She trailed off a bit and started to sway a little more so she plopped down in one of the high back kitchen chairs with a thud and managed not to spill even a drop of her third whiskey sour made from the refrigerated mix.
“Fuckin’ ass hole….” She muttered as her head drooped a little forward.
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