Charlie Miller was jarred awake by a ringing telephone. Picking it up on the third ring, he looked bleary-eyed at the digital alarm next to his bed. "'Lo?" he answered, his voice still thick with sleep.
"Yo, Charlie, it's Max," Charlie winced at Max's always too loud voice.
"Hey, Max," he replied, trying to keep the irritation out of his voice "What's up?" Max Cooper was his foreman, and, in all the 14 years that Charlie had worked at the shop, Max had only called him once.
"I just called to tell ya not to bother to come in to work today. There was a fire last night, and a good part of the place is fried."
"Shit! What happened?" Charlie wouldn't ever be overheard saying he loved his job, but he was paid well, and he did work with some pretty cool guys.
"The fire martial ain't sure. Everyone says it was electrical, though."
"So what the fuck am I supposed to do now?" At that point, he was fully awake and sitting up in bed.
"Charlie, it's July. You got vacation time coming," Max replied. "So take a vacation! At least you'll be getting paid before you have to start drawing unemployment. They don't know what they're gonna do yet, anyway. It might cost too much for them to fix the dump up, so the head pricks might move us to a new building, or something," he speculated. "Anyway, I gotta call a few other guys, so, have fun on your vacation!"
Before he could reply, Max hung up. Charlie hung up the phone and swung his legs over the side of the bed. Maybe this was a good thing, he thought as he walked to the bathroom. A new building, and maybe even some much needed new machinery to make life that much easier. "Now what?" he asked himself as he sat back on the bed. "Go back to sleep, that's what," he smiled to himself.
He woke up five hours later, feeling more relaxed than he had ever felt before. Just to make sure it wasn't a dream, he called the shop, and, instead of the secretary answering with her nasally voice, he was greeted to three very loud tones, and a message saying that the phone was out of service.
Getting out of bed for good, this time, he walked out to the kitchen of his small, three room apartment, and turned on the stove. While he waited for the water to boil for his coffee, he turned on the television and flipped through the channels.
He stopped, as soon as he saw some large breasted blonde taking off her shirt on the Springer show. "They're only tits," he mumbled at the screen. "Why do they always gotta blur them out?"
He watched until the kettle screamed, and then turned off the set. "Might as well give Jimmy a call," he muttered. Jimmy was his slightly younger brother who lived in Florida, and was always asking him to come down there to visit, although he was pretty sure Jimmy's bitch wife Vicki didn't second that request.
Ever since he walked in on her that time when she was getting out of the shower, she had always thought it had been on purpose. It didn't matter that he was still half asleep, or the fact that she didn't bother to lock the door. Nope, Charlie had done it on purpose. Thankfully, Jimmy believed him, although he never received that luxury from Vicki.
Charlie punched in the numbers for Jimmy, and took a sip of his coffee while he waited for someone to pick up. As luck would have it, it was Vicki. "Hey, Vic," he smirked into the phone. As soon as he heard her voice, he instantly brought up a visual of Vicki's naked body fully displayed for that brief nanosecond. Her small B cups, pink nipples and her hairless slit were right there in the living color of his imagination.
"Jimmy's not here," replied sourly.
"Hello to you too," he replied, trying to sound cheerful, when he was, in fact sticking his middle finger up at the phone. It had been six years already. How long could she hold a grudge? "Any idea when he'll be back?"
"No, he's...oh, wait, here he is now. It's peeping Charlie," he heard her mumble as she handed the phone to Jimmy.
"Hey, Charlie!" Jimmy said, sounding genuinely happy.
"Hey, Jimmy, how's it goin?"
"Great, great! How are things with you?" Before Charlie could answer, Jimmy started talking again. "Hey, aren't you supposed to be at work?" In the background, he could hear Vicki say something about him probably getting fired.
"It's so refreshing how that woman loves me, ya know, bro?" he said sarcastically. "Yeah, I should be at work, but I got a phone call this morning telling me the shop all but burned down last night."
"Oh man, that sucks," Jimmy replied, and in the back ground Charlie heard Vickie say "Told you so!" Jimmy then made an attempt to cover the mouthpiece as he told her Charlie's shop burned down. "So, what are your plans, now?"
"Well, I was told I'm officially on vacation, and once that's up, I collect unemployment until they either fix up the old shop, or get us a new one. Any way you could talk your darling wife into letting me come down there for a visit?"
"Actually, this is perfect timing," Jimmy told him. "We need a house sitter, someone we can trust for a couple of weeks, and your situation would be perfect!"
In the background, Charlie heard Vicki squeak, "Trust who?"
"I can do that," he nodded as if Jimmy could see him. "Although I was hoping to get to spend time with you, you know, maybe do a little fishing or something."
"If you're still not back working after we get back, we could catch up!' Jimmy replied enthusiastically. "So you'll come?"
"When do you need me to be there?"
"I'll tell you what," Jimmy replied, and Charlie could tell he was grinning. "I'll go on line and see the earliest flight I can get you, and then I'll call you back. All you have to do is go to the airport and get on the plane, ok?"
"Sounds good to me!" Charlie grinned. "I'll go start packing."
***********************
"She's not happy, is she?" Charlie asked Jimmy as they drove.
"No, not really. I'm sorry, Charlie," Jimmy apologized. "Hell, the only reason I got her to agree to it, is the fact that we wouldn't be here."
"It's been six years, Jim! C'mon! What do I have to do?"
"Shit, damned if I know," his younger brother shrugged. "She still brings up that time she found women's underwear under our bed, and she's still pissed about it, even though it wasn't my fault. The person we had hired to watch the place for us took to 'entertaining' some spring break girls that were around." He then pointed at Charlie. "You look great, by the way," he told him.
"Thanks. I've lost twenty-five pounds since I quite drinking. I thought it would get me Brenda back, but," he shrugged and looked out the window. "She said too little, too late." He shrugged again. "I'm way better off without her, anyway. I got me a small apartment, I make some pretty good money, I'm doin ok for myself."
"That's great! You look a lot healthier, too."
"So, where are you off to, that you need a house sitter for two weeks?"
"The real estate firm that Vicki works for gave her a free trip to Barbados for winning the sales rep of the year award," Jimmy grinned.
"Cool," Charlie nodded. "And how's your golf cart business?"
"Charlie, this is Florida," Jimmy grinned. "How good do you think it is?" He then gave a small shrug. "You know, if things don't work out for you up north, you could always come to work for me down here," he told him seriously.
"Oh, I'm sure Vicki would just adore you for that bright idea!" Charlie laughed.
"She has no say in it," he replied defensively.
"Yeah? Then I dare you, no I Triple Dog DARE you to say it in front of her," Charlie laughed, calling his bluff. "In fact," he continued as Jimmy sputtered for a reply. "I dare you to take it one step further, and TELL her that you asked me to come live down here and work for you, and that I agreed!" he chuckled.
"You know what?" Jimmy replied, gripping the steering wheel tighter. "It's high time I wore the pants in this family. I love her so much, that I've let her pretty much take over everything! But no more! Fuck this shit! I'm going to tell her, as soon as we walk in!"
Charlie had never heard Jimmy swear like that, and couldn't ever remember him being so determined about anything that went against Vicki's wishes. "How's your sex life, little bro?" Charlie chuckled.
"Average, why?" Jimmy asked a little nervously.
"Because, you're going away with her for two weeks, and if you had any plans of getting laid more often than you probably do, you can probably kiss them goodbye," Charlie told him. "Forget it, I was just bustin' your balls. Don't say anything to her."
"No, Charlie, you're absolutely right! I can see it all clearly now. You're my brother, damn it, and I honestly believe it was an accident!" He then started laughing. "Shit, I still remember that look on your face," he cackled. "You looked like you didn't know if you wanted to shit or go blind. THAT, right there, told me it was an accident."
As Jimmy opened the trunk and helped Charlie with his luggage, he took a deep breath. "Well, here goes nothing," he muttered.
"Jimmy, don't, man. I was kidding!" It was no use, however. Jimmy was already walking towards the house like a man on a mission.
He waited until Charlie came up behind him before he said anything. As soon as Charlie was in the house, Jimmy set his jaw and looked like he was going to start. Charlie, however, decided to cut him off, at least for the time being. "Hi, Vicki. It's good to see you again. You look great." As soon as he said that last line, he knew he had fucked up.
"Oh, I just BET I look great to you!" she fumed at him. She opened her mouth to say more, when Jimmy cut her off.
"Enough, Vicki," he told her, his voice calm.
"What did you just say?" she growled, suddenly rounding on Jimmy. "Don't you EVER..."
"Shut the fuck UP!" he retorted, suddenly taking two steps to stand directly in front of her. The look on her face was one of shock and disbelief. "It's been six fucking years, Vicki! For Christ's sake, give Charlie a break, will you? I've had enough of your shit, especially about this!"
