The End of Nothing

Chapter 6

After tying up her sneakers, Margie pulled up the leg warmers that Mrs. Wu insisted she wear. Something about "the eighties being alive again in her fitness class" was the only explanation Margie got before they were thrown at her. Mrs. Wu's dance class wasn't until later in the evening, but Mrs. Wu demanded she get ready early so that she could run errands for her, Minnie, and her Mom.

She soon learned, after visiting her mom's room looking like she just stepped out of an eighties workout tape, that their idea of errands was just Margie sneaking fast food to them from McDonalds. Technically they were all on specialized diets tailored to help with each of their medical conditions, but knowing Minnie and Mrs. Wu for the past few days, Margie doubted they struck to their diets very often.

Making her way down the hallway, grumbling about Minnie's order of 40 chicken nuggets, she stumbled upon Silas kneeling down towards the wooden baseboards, trying to fish something out of the air vent. His butt was pointed into the air, encased in old, worn blue jeans. And what a nice butt it was. Margie paused temporarily in the hall to get a good look.

Hearing the pause in steps, Silas glanced up from his position on the floor, breaking out laughing at the sight of Margie in her workout outfit. Fat tears ran down his face, which he brushed away quickly, just to take another look at Margie, and have them begin again.

"Yeah, laugh it up, Mrs. Wu will probably trick you into a pair of this puppies before the end of the week," Margie said chuckling, gesturing to her bright leg warmers.

"No, you look great, they suit you," Silas responded as he finally got the tears to stop flowing.

"Thanks, I appreciate that, even though it's a lie," Margie smiled, "I don't know who made these or why Mrs. Wu had them lying around, but I think Mrs. Wu herself is the only one who could pull these off." Margie modeled the leg warmers as she said this, striking poses akin to ancient Greek statues. By the time she got to the thinker, Silas was laughing uncontrollably again.

"Uncle, uncle, you need to stop or I'm going to pee." Silas reached out to pause her as she made to change positions, the contact with her arm making them both pause. Margie glanced up at Silas through her lashes and he looked down at her with red tear-tracks still staining his cheeks.

Internally, Margie was freaking out. Normally she was an introvert to a fault, so even standing here and flirting with Silas had her surprising herself. She'd recognized after the whole coffee machine debacle that she had a growing attraction to Silas, and obviously her operation ASAAC had failed miserably. What to do about it was the problem. She knew she was leaving soon, she had school and work to get back to, so she didn't know if starting something with Silas would be a good idea, or even if he'd want to start something with her in the first place. That thought made her pause, a slight dip to form between her eyebrows at the thought.

Silas' hand being removed from her arm drew her out of her thoughts, he smiled at her as he shifted back.

"Well, I'd better be going, I have a lot of nuggets to buy," she held up the list that Mrs. Wu had made for her, after she'd accidently said Minnie only wanted 20 nuggets when they made her recite their orders. The paper had 40 underlined six times for emphasis. Why Minnie needed that many nuggets, Margie had no idea.

"Do you want me to grab you anything while I'm out?" Margie said it out of courtesy, but realized her mistake after Silas made her add two big macs and an order of large fries to her list.

How much do the people in this place eat? She wondered as she finally made her way out of the front doors.

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Margie was in a mood as she stalked her way back through the retirement home parking lot. She was making up a complaint letter in her head to send to the owners of McDonalds, something that she'd never actually do, but was nice to alleviate some of her frustration. So what if one lady in leg warmers wanted to buy $65.10 worth of fast food? The McDonalds workers made her seem like some kind of freak show.

Catching her reflection in the mirror of the front doors, she swallowed up her anger. She did look like a mess. Her hair had come out of its nicely placed ponytail, her cheeks were bright red from annoyance and the exertion of carrying this much food, and the eight overly-stuffed bags of food she was juggling dwarfed her body, to a comical degree.

"Oh my," after her exclamation, Judy was right there to assist her as she entered the building, offering her a wheelchair to hold the food.

"Thanks Judy, you're a lifesaver!" Margie sifted through one of the bags and handed Judy her order, her penance for Judy keeping the food a secret from Helga, the only nurse that was a known stickler for the diet plans. Making her way towards her Mom's room, she stopped by Bernie's room, to see him and Silas drawing a map of the retirement home vent systems on a piece of paper. Their heads shot up at the same time, guilty looks on their faces. Silas went to open his mouth with an explanation.

"Save it. I don't want to know, so that I can be charged for any involvement later." Margie threw their bags of food at them and turned her wheelchair of junk food around, continuing on her way to her Mom's room.