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The rooster was going off again at 5 in the morning. It was time to do something...what was that thing? Oh yes. Get up and greet the day. Siggie stood up on her bed and turned toward the western facing window. There was the hint of the coming sun on the horizon.
"Hello!"
Siggie sat back down and flopped back on her pillow and stared up at the ceiling. The water stain from the upstairs bathroom Great Tub Leak of 2012 looked like a big moon face winking at her. She winked back. What would she do today? It was the beginning of summer and she didn't have a summer job yet. She should job hunt, maybe, but it seemed like a nicer idea to just enjoy one of her first days off without needing to do anything in a long time. Take a walk. Read a book. Read a book while walking. Sit outside. Get annoyed by ants. Let a fly land on her knee and watch it clean its legs. Her eyes drifted closed as she considered her day.
Water. Dripping, Dripping. Dripping. She was slowly losing her mind. Her eyes flew open. It was just a dream. But no, there it was again. Water. Dripping. The big moon face was crying. Siggie jumped out of bed and ran upstairs. The bathroom door was closed and there was the sound of running water. She knocked rather hard on it. No answer. She pounded on it.
"What?!" came her mother's sleepy and annoyed sounding voice.
"Take off your freaking cucumbers!"
"What?" Splashing sounds. "Oh shit! Get towels!"
Siggie ran to the hall closet and grabbed as many bath towels as she could fit in her arms, then ran back to the door. She realized now that the carpet just outside the bathroom door was soaking.
"I'm coming in!" Siggie pressed her body against the towels on the door so she could free her right hand and use her thumb nail to twist counter-clockwise the lock and unlock the door knob. She turned the knob and let the door fall open and the towels fall to the ground. She took barely a second to process the sight of her mother with a green beauty mask of some sort on her face, standing naked in the tub with a forlorn look on her face before she started unfolding towels and laying them all around the floor to soak up the water.
The mark on the door. As Siggie lay the towels out, it took her another several seconds to process that there had been a big red X on the door. It looked as if it had been drawn on with lipstick. Cherry Red, if she weren't mistaken. So it was one of those days for her mom. She finished laying out the first round of towels and went back to the closet for more. Gone were any thoughts of a walk and a book, an ant and a fly. It was going to be a Mom day. She took the next armful of towels into the bathroom and dropped all but one, which she draped around her mom's shoulders.
"Dry off, Mom." Her mom started drying off and Siggie finished laying the rest of these towels around the floor, then picked up one of the first towels she had laid out and took it to the tub to wring it out. "Don't forget to wash the mask off."
"It's supposed to be on for twenty minutes," her mom said. Siggie just looked at her and she sighed. "You're right. I guess I don't know how long I was asleep."