I awake to the sound of rushing water. I look at my husband to see if he hears it too. He looks back at me.
“What is that?” He asks.
We get out of bed and follow the sound to the bathroom down the hall. We stand, listening, our heads tilted like confused dogs.
“It sounds like it’s under the floor?”
“But I hear it in the kitchen too! Come here!”
I call a plumbing company and explain what is going on. The woman on the other end of the line is nice and tells me she’ll send someone right over.
I head to the kitchen and start making lunches for my children, when I hear my oldest in the noisy bathroom, vomiting. “Mom, I think I’m sick.”
”Just . . . go back to bed. Plumbers are coming.”
He says nothing, but turns and heads to his room, closing the door behind him.
My middle child has to be at school early so we hop in the minivan to head to the school in the dark. It feels stuffy, so I reach down and turn on the air conditioner. Nothing happens. I mess with it for a couple of minutes until my son says, “Mom! I’m going to be late!”
I pull out of the driveway and head down our street, trying not to notice the lack of air flowing through the vehicle. The windows began to fog over so I switch the knob to defrost. Again, nothing. I crack the windows to let in some air. My son immediately rolls his window back up. “I don’t like it.”
Once I’m back home, it’s time to get my youngest child ready for school. I stress her out telling her to get her stuff and get in the minivan because I need to get her to school and get back in time for the plumbers.
I drop her off, “Bye, Kiddo! Have a good day!” She glares at me as she gets out of the minivan and closes the door.
I hurry home and try to talk our pitbull/boxer mix into going into my room. He’s a guard dog and won’t be too friendly with the plumbers. He sits, looking at me, head tilted to the right. “Hey! I did that same thing earlier this morning,” I said. He just tilts his head to the left.
I grab treats and get his attention. He follows me down the hall to my room. I toss some treats on the bed and he jumps on, happily snatching up the treats. “Sorry, buddy,” I say as I close the bedroom door.
I head back to the living room and hear a knock. I kick some wrappers under the couch and toss pillows that have been knocked off, back onto chairs where they belong, before hurriedly answering the door.
I sit at my desk, and hope to get caught up on some content writing as the plumbers fix the issue.
“Um, ma’am? Has the plumbing always been like this? I mean, when you build a house, pipes travel in a certain direction but your pipes don’t go where they’re supposed to. I don’t know know where they go.”
I listen as he says they may have to bust up walls and concrete to fix the rushing water issue.
“I mean, I don’t know where the pipes are or where they go! I’m pretty sure the problem is in this smaller bathroom, but we’d have to tear it up to find the issue.”
He pauses. “We’re going to go make some calls. See what we can do without destroying your house.”
They leave.
I look at the clock. Its only 8:30.
