Did I mention both Mac and Luke are engineers by trade? Granted, Mac designed telecom networks before he got promoted to management, but Luke’s a full-on civil engineer. He’s responsible for designing bridges and buildings and roads, which means he’s supposed to have a basic working knowledge of geometry. When they were debating Operation Window, I should have left them both to their devices, but no, I wanted to help, so that’s what I did.
We began to maneuver our way through the sliding glass doors, me in front and Luke and Mac in the back. Our kitten Agent Jack Bauer — who at nine months old is almost twenty pounds — waited until we were all positioned halfway through the door before making a break for it through our legs and into the woods behind the house.
When I attempted to chase after him, Mac screamed at me not to drop the tub, and I was stuck. I’m sure the cat will be fine, as he’s escaped a couple of times before and there’s very little traffic on this street. My concern is for any woodland creature that crosses his path. Agent Jack Bauer is precisely as deadly as his namesake, only our Jack Bauer is more likely to kill chipmunks, not terrorists. Actually, all of our kittens are ass kickers, hence their names: General Patton,136 Charles Bronson,137 and Sun Tzu.138
So, through the house we went, and now we’re at the turn in the stairwell and we’re thoroughly and profoundly stuck.
“Guys, we need to angle it up and to the left to get it over the newel,” I instruct.
“No, I think we have to wedge it more this way,” Luke disagrees, turning and shoving the lip of the tub until it’s firmly lodged between two wide wood balusters.
“Wrong!” Mac chimes in. “We’ve got to go even more to the right.” And then Mac bashes the corner into the riser.
“You guys, please! I’ve got the better vantage point. Up and to the left!” I plead.
“How about if I try this?” Mac asks, shoving his section of the tub into the stringer, which leaves an enormous gash and makes me wince. The stairs, up until five minutes ago, were the one undamaged portion of this whole house.
“Or what about this?” Luke throws his weight into the side of the tub and hits something, causing it to splinter.
“That didn’t sound right,” Mac says, and Luke agrees.
The fiberglass begins to get slippery. “I’m starting to lose my hold on this thing. Can you just do what I ask and go up and to the left?”
“That’s why you need to wear gloves for this kind of project. See here, Mac? I’ve got the rubber dots on these and they grip like crazy. It’s like the tub would stick to my hands even if I let go.”
“Please do not let go!” I call from my perch on the landing.
“I go more for the high-tech gloves,” Mac says. He rests his shoulder against the tub and shows Luke his hands. “For me, I’m all about the gel inserts. They aren’t quite as grippy as what you’ve got, but I find they go a long way in shock absorption. Hey, when we’re done, I should show you my new shooting gloves. The Palm Swell protects all the nerves in the center of your hand so you don’t get so tired when you’re on the range. Fatigue is the number one cause of misfired—”
“I’m about to drop the tub!” I shout, as the fiberglass slips out of my non-rubber-tipped, non-gel-coated, non-shock-absorbed hands. My end flips forward while the portion the boys are carrying wedges tightly in the stairwell.
The tub is lodged almost completely upright. I can’t see around it, but from the sounds of it, the guys are fine.
“Hey, what happened?” Mac asks.
“I guess I couldn’t hold on to a hundred-pound tub myself,” I acidly reply.
“You should probably get some gloves,” Luke adds helpfully.
Argh.
I grab the tub on either side and shake it in hopes of dislodging it. No such luck. “You guys, try it from your end!”
I hear huffing and shoving, and if I position myself right, I can see the guys through the tub’s drain hole. Luke’s hurling himself into the tub while Mac tries to lift.
“Yeah, it’s stuck, all right,” Luke confirms.
“Well, unstick it, please; I’ve got plans later.” In a little while I’m supposed to meet Kara at her parents’ house for her big outing. Poor thing was so nervous that she made herself sick and had to take the day off work. I’ve been trying to talk her off the ledge all day.
Mac takes charge. “Let me see what I can do. Luke, what we need here are tools. Let’s go.”
“Wait. Don’t go. Maybe we—” But by then it’s too late. They head directly out the front door toward Mac’s workbench in the detached garage, leaving me alone at the top of the stairs with my thoughts.
I have two thoughts right now. One, that I should have never offered to emcee the goat rodeo that is carrying a tub up the stairs, and two, that I deeply, desperately, urgently need to pee.
I wait for at least twenty minutes before they return, crossing my legs the entire time. We don’t have any functional bathrooms yet and we’re still going in the Porta Potti. As soon as we got the tub upstairs, the guys were going to work on the toilet. I suggested they do the toilet first, what with my deep and abiding love of using the restroom indoors, but they insisted it would be easier to get the tub out of the way.
Yeah. Easy.
“What the hell, you guys?” I ask when they finally return.
“Oh, sorry,” Mac replies. “Luke wanted to see my new impact driver, so we were looking at that.”
“Can we please get me out of here? I’m about to wet my pants!”
“Then use the bathroom,” Luke suggests.
“I would, but you guys haven’t installed it yet! Hurry, please; I’m dying!”
“Whatever you do, don’t think of waterfalls or swimming or anything,” Luke instructs.
“That was very helpful, thank you,” I seethe.
“Hey,” Mac says, “we can probably fit a coffee can or something over the top of the tub and you can go in that.”
“What are you talking about?” Luke argues. “When’s the last time you saw anyone buy a can of coffee? What are you, eighty years old? Gonna use your S&H Green Stamps to buy something nice before you listen to your Pat Boone album? Coffee can, ha! She could probably go in a Starbucks bag, but I’m not sure they’re watertight. Oh, hey, have you tried those VIA packets? Not bad. I keep them in my desk at work—”
Through clenched teeth, I say, “A can isn’t going to fit. Can we please stop talking about coffee now and start moving the tub?”
“Okay,” says Mac, finally taking charge. “Here’s how we’re going to do this. Mia, you’re going to stand at the top and push, and Luke and I are going to come underneath and pull.”
We try this for a few minutes and manage only to jam the tub in more. Then the guys lift the bottom as I pull up and back. We make a tiny bit of progress, but it’s a hollow victory, due to how much this gouges the balusters. We’re just starting to get somewhere when Luke stops us. “Listen, guys, I’m having a low-blood-sugar crash. I think I had too many VIAs today. They’re just so easy to make! You just rip ’em open and add hot water! Bam, that’s it! Anyway, I can’t do this until I eat. Do you have something with protein in it?”
“We’re not doing a lot of cooking here, but we may have some hot dogs in the back of the minifridge,” Mac tells him. “You can heat it up in the microwave in the corner.” The microwave Vlad ordered has arrived, and not a moment too soon. I was getting really tired of eating my SpaghettiOs hobo-style.
Luke starts to trot off, but then stops himself. “Wait. Where are my manners — Mia, would you like a hot dog?”