The Meeting

The Meeting - 992 words

“Attention!  Attention!  This meeting will now come to order!”

“Stats are not as high as I'd like this week!  I've seen a relaxed expression on the human's face far too often!.  You know how it goes: relaxation leads to more energy, energy leads to a clean and peaceful  home, and a peaceful home leads to happiness.  You know we gremlins CANNOT allow happiness!  Walkways and Paths Team, how is the Stair Project coming on?”

“Um....okay, sir.  We've managed two pulls this week.”

“Only TWO?”

“Well, sir, the first time we removed the bottom stair as she was going down, and that went well.  She was sure there was one more, and the whole basket of clean laundry got dumped when she tripped on the empty space.  She was so busy picking up and refolding that she never turned around while we replaced it.”

“And?”

“Well, the next day we put an extra stair at the top.  But when she stumbled and banged her shoulder on the wall, she immediately turned and looked.  We slipped it away in the nick of time, but she may have glimpsed motion out of the very corner of her eye. We were afraid to try again until we were sure she'd forgotten.  We did manage to wrinkle the hall rug multiple times,  resulting in three stumbles and one stubbed toe.”

“Nearly SEEN!  You know the trouble that would lead to!  We'd have to erase the memory again, and you know she always loses too many other memories with it. Last time she couldn't remember anything she needed once she got to the grocery store!  If this keeps up, she'll end up having a “nice rest” somewhere, and then where will we be?”

“We know, sir, we know.  We're really sorry.”

“Well, gentlegrem, I am too, but I'll have to write you up for this.  Near sightings are not trivial.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Kitchen Team?  How is it going?”

“It's going quite well, sir.  We rewired the crock-pot so it shorted out right after she left for work.  She was highly infuriated when she came home from work, expecting a nice hot dinner and finding nothing but raw chicken! She expressed her anger quite vocally, using every known profanity and a few invented ones.  We picked the day before grocery day, so she ended up with cold cereal for dinner again!”

“Great work!  Go on.”

“After grocery day, we emptied the jars of several condiments and spices she hadn't gotten because she was sure they were nearly full.  She was missing several key items for her Stir-Fry, and she gave up and made peanut butter and jelly.  Or she tried to.  We'd emptied all but the tiniest scraping of jelly, so she had a lot of dry peanut butter stuck to the roof of her mouth.”

“Excellent!”

“We managed to hide thirty-six utensils, gadgets, or small appliances at various times this week.  Of course, once she gave up and made do without them, we replaced them.  She turned very interesting colors when she found them where she'd already looked so many times.”

“Thirty-six Hides!  I AM impressed!”

“Oh, and each and every time she cleaned the counter, we replaced a small patch of crumbs or stickiness.  She kept wiping it more and more, but every time she came in, she thought she'd missed a spot.”

“Look for bonuses this week, gentlegrem!  Laundry Team?”

“Not a bad week, sir.  Two missing socks, shoes hidden four times, removed most of the fabric softener so she's only using a speck, trying to make it last until she can get to the store.  All of her towels are rough and crunchy.”

“Not bad, Team, not bad at all.”

“Oh, and for a final touch, we took all of her clean underwear out of her drawer, sprayed them with a light squirt of Instant Wrinkle spray--Sweaty Human scent--and put them in with the rest of her dirty laundry.  After her shower she went nuts trying to find a clean pair.  She really berated herself for letting all the clean ones run out, “again!”

“Nice touch!  General Havoc Team?”

“Sir, we've had a fairly good week.  We've moved her keys daily, resulting in multiple latenesses.  Twice, we tied extra tight knots in her shoelaces so she had to take the time to untie them.  We moved her debit card to the pocket of her jeans in the clothes hamper, so that when she got to the gas station she had to come all the way home and find it before she could put gas in the car.  Her stress level was quite high, but she did manage to coast back to the station on fumes before the gas ran out.  As usual, three times this week every pen and pencil in the house was destroyed and flushed down the toilet.  She had to keep bringing more home from work, resulting in mild guilt.  We shuffled the contents of her files and moved seventeen various odd and ends from the places they belonged.

“Unfortunately, just as she was due to leave for yoga class, she found the yoga mat that we'd hidden in the freezer.  Sadly, she wasn't even late for class, but she WAS flustered and annoyed with herself because it seemed she'd unthinkingly put something in the wrong place “again.”  And she nearly got frostbite on her backside during class.”

“Well, that's something.  All right, gentlegrem.  Let's wrap up this meeting.  It was a tolerable week, but we're really going to have to step it up.  You act like you don't know what human happiness causes!  Have you forgotten that if she gets truly happy, we're out of a home!  That happiness will bounce you straight out if you even TRY to enter! This week, I'll expect all team members to show determination, creativity, chaos!  That human had better have no less than mild despair!  Meeting adjourned.”