Kindle Edition
Amazon
Charlene Wexler
Charlene Wexler
Amazon
Category:
Western
Publisher: Amazon Digital Services
Pages: 190
Copyright: Jan. 19, 2016
Price: $2.99 (eBook)
Elephants In The Room is a collection of short fiction and essays examining life, love, and the tragedy and comedy of the human condition.
Elephants In The Room is a collection of short fiction and essays examining life, love, and the tragedy and comedy of the human condition.
In Elephants In The Room, Wexler's fiction and essays are grouped in five catgories.
Coming of Age features essays and fiction about growing up and reaching some of life's milestones--whether you are ready or not.
In Family and Friends, you'll meet some of the fun characters in Wexler's life and in her fiction, and inevitably you'll think about similar loved ones in your own world. The story "Elephants In The Room," from which the title of this book is derived, appears in this section.
What would life be without our animal pals? Wexler shares some stories about four-footed friends and loved ones in Animal Magnetism.
The Passing Parade features Wexler's fiction and prose observations on the changes in our fast-paced world.
Senior Moments contains Wexler's wry, humorous, and even serious observations on the mature years.
Elephants In The Room is a collection of stories that will pluck at your heartstrings and tickle your funnybone.
Excerpt
No More Free Pie
“Where are you going?” my husband, Sam, asks.
“To have lunch with my sister,” I answer.
“You just had lunch with her a few days ago,” he says.
I walk out of the house shaking my head. He just doesn’t understand.
Women need to visit with and talk to other women. We need girlfriends we can trust, ones who love and understand us. Ones who will listen, accept our faults, and are honest with us. Ones who are there for the good and the tragic.
I have several special girlfriends I can count on, but my best friend, the one I’ve known the longest, and the one with whom I have the most history, is my sister, Bobbi.
We both have busy lives, she more than I, as she still is working while I, the elder, am retired.
In spite of this we make a point of meeting at least once a week.
Bobbi and I live about fifty miles from each other, so we are always looking for a half-way spot. We thought we found a good one at a Baker’s Square.
I am always early and Bobbi is always tardy, so on this particular Wednesday afternoon I thought nothing about her being thirty minutes late.
Sitting in a booth towards the middle of the room near the windows, drinking my third cup of coffee, and checking my e-mails on my phone, I was a little alarmed when my bedraggled sister collapsed into the booth, opposite me.
“I’m sorry I’m late but….” This was how most of our meetings began. There was always a good story after the buts, like the time she locked her keys in the car and had to be towed, or when she dropped her cell phone in her coffee cup and she couldn’t call me, or when she got delayed in a bakery which had made 12,000 cookies instead of the 6,000 she had ordered for her business demonstrations, or….
Anyway, I cut her conversation off with, “You look a mess. What happened now?”
She answered, “I was on my way when I realized my car was out of gas. Knowing that I was already late, I stopped to get just enough gas to get here. When I pulled the hose out of the pump I spilled gas on me.”
Well, she did smell funny. “Are you okay?” I asked. “Do you want to go home and change? You’re not going to catch on fire, are you?” I looked around to make sure no one was smoking.
“Don’t worry about it,” she responded. “I washed off.” So I ignored her new dilemma and we proceeded to order lunch and visit.
After about ten minutes we began to notice several employees of the restaurant walking around sniffing and scanning the surroundings in our area. We ignored them and concentrated on our salads and conversation.
Soon, we heard the sounds of fire engines that seemed to be very close—so close, in fact, that firemen actually entered the restaurant and announced over a bullhorn, “Please do not be alarmed, but we suspect a gas leak somewhere towards the middle of the room and we need to evacuate everyone in the restaurant.”
Bobbi and I sank down low in our seats while everyone in the restaurant became alarmed and rushed for the exits. Meekly, we approached the firemen.
“I may be the cause of the alarm…” my sister said.
“She spilled gas on herself while pumping it at the station,” I said, completing her sentence.
There was no gas leak in the restaurant, of course, and we finished our meal after the chuckling firemen departed, the restaurant staff shooting us dirty looks all the while.
Needless to say, we had to find a new place to meet. Too bad. The pie was so good at Baker’s Square, and it was free on Wednesday with a meal.
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