The Heat

Steve stood with the freezer door open, just trying to imagine he was somewhere else.  Perhaps he was on frozen tundra somewhere running with polar bears; or perhaps sitting in a log cabin somewhere in the Swiss Alps.  Steven’s mind cycled through dozens of places.  Where ever Steven imagine, it was certainly cooler than here.

            The air conditioner had gone out 2 days ago.  He swore it would be fixed by now.  That bloated, wheezing, mound of a man who was always wiping himself with that stained handkerchief was nowhere to be seen.  He was probably off spending Steven’s rent money. Steven would have put in a window unit by now, but the bars on the windows made that an impossibility.  Many of Steven’s neighbors had already fled, like rats fleeing a sinking ship.  Steven would have done the same, but he was stubborn.  Plus his girlfriend was out of town.

            So Steven stood in his apartment amongst the fans, naked except for his white briefs.  He would have discarded them as well if it were not for his massive feelings of inadequacy that somehow managed to manifest even when he was alone.  The sweat rolled down his skin as he paced his tiny hovel, trying to keep his mind on other things.  He had tried to go into work, but Mr. Eliott, his boss, made him stay home.  The old buzzard wanted Steven to cook, to bake in his own frustration.  It would not surprise Steven if Mr. Eliott had arranged the whole thing.  He had probably sent in one of his ninja squads to disable the AC and then paid off the landlord to do nothing. 

            That is why Steven needed to survive.  He had to beat this Inferno-like torture and emerge unscathed, excepting a few pounds lost.  He wiped the sweat from his eyes again and plotted his survival.  He reached for the frozen bag of peas one more time and regretted for the one thousandth time finding an apartment on craigslist.