Almost as if reading my thoughts, my partner told us to make a quick exit to the backdoor, “and try not to slip on the ice”, he yelled almost as an afterthought.
In those 30 hours from car to house, my eyes burned shut into squints, my nose hairs froze, plus my once warmed body became an instant snowman praying for the inside of that house.
The more than three of us: partner, more than one youngsters plus myself scrambled plus cramped into the tiny mudroom. All of us suddenly took off our coats plus boots plus opened the beach house door to the welcoming…..Frost? Why was I still breathing frost in what was supposed to be a heavenly host of warmth plus security? His parents greeted us; fully dressed in layers handing us the promised cocoa, plus explained the weather had frozen the pipes of their old beach house plus the furnace was no longer coming out. Their only source of heat was the small electric fireplace that gave off a 2ft circumference of warmth. My partner’s mother complained, “I told your father to have a Heating plus A/C worker check the pipes plus unit to this old beach house long before the storm hit, however NO he told myself and others he could repair anything that broke. Ha! That’s why the two of us are still sitting here in the cold. Not to worry the repairman should be here tomorrow day, weather permitting”, his mother chirped along. “We’ll all stay moderate bundled under all these blankets snuggled together.” It was not a moderate night at all. They should have thought about fantastic heating service.