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    The Shake Up
    The Shake Up
    The Shake Up
    Ebook77 pages1 hour

    The Shake Up

    By Dwayne Phillips

    ()

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    About this ebook

    The new President announced his programs and conceded that they would "shake up" the economy for a few weeks. Twenty-one months later, the Freeman family struggled each day as the Great Depression pounded the 21st century American suburbs.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherDwayne Phillips
    Release dateOct 10, 2013
    ISBN9781301418381
    The Shake Up
    Author

    Dwayne Phillips

    A systems and computer engineer since 1980. A short story fiction writer.

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      Book preview

      The Shake Up - Dwayne Phillips

      The Shake Up

      Dwayne Phillips

      Smashwords Edition

      Copyright 2013

      Smashwords Edition, License Notes.

      This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the author's work.

      The Shake Up

      FRIDAY

      Bev died at 5 o’clock on Friday morning. Her husband, Dave, thought that was odd since she never was a morning person. Dying was the one early morning significant accomplishment of her life.

      Cancer had run its course over several painful, cruel months. Decades earlier, the American Cancer Society had promised Congress that given money, an exorbitant sum at the time but paltry today, they would find a cure for cancer in a few years. A million times that money and ten times those years showed that the best intentions led to yet another foolish government program.

      Beverly died at home in her bed. The wish of elderly Americans for most of its history, dying at home, was now the curse of the best intentions in the history of the nation. It was the result of politicians driven by hopes of re-elections and eventual statues.

      The dream of health care for all produced health care for the top 1% of the 1%. The press labeled these few the plutocrats at the end of the first quarter of the 21st century. Artificial price limits, open borders with Canada and Mexico, and a black market that dwarfed that seen during Prohibition extinguished health care for the rich, the middle class, and the poor. Doctors went underground, served the plutocrats for money, and treated everyone else for barter. Everyone had health insurance, and when everyone had something, that something was worthless.

      Dave cursed the health care system created by the Federal government. Then Dave cursed himself.

      Logic, rational, and reason, he thought. My wife his dead and I am analyzing government programs.

      Dave allowed one tear from his right eye to roll down his check. He forced himself not to touch the liquid that signified the passing of the one person who held his world together for three decades. His wife of 32 years had expired while he held her hand. Perhaps, he thought, the life in his hand would drip something into her hand, something that would make a difference. It was silly, illogical. Dave cursed himself again.

      Dave reached for Bev’s other hand. It was room temperature and that frightened Dave. The hand he had been holding held the warmth imparted by Dave’s hand. Dave touched Bev’s forehead and then her cheek. They both lacked the warmth of life as well. Dave pulled the bed sheet up until it covered Bev’s face. He looked at her, leaned forward, and pulled the bed sheet so that it covered what was left of her hair on top of her head.

      It is finished, whispered Dave. He sat with his head slightly bowed.

      Dave was still for a moment until a slight sound pulled his gaze to the open bedroom door. Michelle, the wife of his youngest son Drew, was on her knees. She was bowed in prayer.

      Please, no, don’t. started Dave. You shouldn’t.

      Dave stopped his pleading. It must have been painful for Michelle, more than eight months pregnant, to lower herself into a kneeled posture. Dave couldn’t allow her to struggle back to her feet alone. He left the side of his deceased wife for the last time and stepped quickly to Michelle. He stood over her while her lips trembled a few moments. Tears, many more than Dave shed, rolled down her face onto her hands clutched together below her chin.

      Dave waited. He cursed himself again. This young woman who had known Bev only two years was anguishing over her passing. Dave, however, had left his wife’s side in a pathetic attempt at chivalry to help a pregnant woman to her feet.

      Michelle opened her eyes, unclasped her hands, and noticed Dave’s extended, trembling hand. She held his hand with both of hers and pulled on it with all her weight. Dave had forgotten the weight and awkwardness of a soon-to-be mother.

      I’m sorry, Dad, whispered Michelle. She was wonderful. She treated me better than I ever deserved, better than anyone ever has.

      The two stood silently for a few seconds. Dave felt her trembling. Dave felt no emotion.

      I’ll tell Drew, said Michelle to interrupt the silence. If that’s okay with you. If you want, you can tell him, I mean I don’t want to step in wrong or something, I mean…

      Thank you, said Dave to stop her loving rambling. Please tell him for me.

      Michelle turned and walked the three steps, four given her condition, to the door of the office that had become the bedroom for her and Drew a year earlier. She disappeared behind its door. It was the smallest bedroom in the house, and that seemed fair as Drew was the youngest son of Bev and Dave Freeman and they didn’t have any children, yet.

      Dave found himself standing in his bedroom door. He didn’t turn back to look at the bed that held his wife. Nothing could force him to do that. He felt shame, and that forced him to walk away from his bedroom and close the door behind him.

      Dave walked the bedroom hallway and descended the stairs to the main floor of the four-bedroom, vinyl-sided house that he and Bev had inhabited for 25 years. He cursed himself again. Inhabited! Couldn’t he think of something, some word, some feeling to encompass a life with another person, a life with three sons and now their wives and children? Inhabited! The word crashed back and forth in his brain until he reached the kitchen.

      Taylor, the elder son of the family, stood next to the kitchen counter pouring himself a cup of weak coffee, the kind that had been

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