We all love those clips of soldiers and sailors coming home, greeting or surprising their loved ones, hugging everyone and laughing and so forth. Ever wonder what’s on the other side of those? Like, what does the next day look like? Why, balance in the universe, of course, which as we know from holy writ, I mean, Marvel movies, is dictated by Thanos, a supremely evil character.
So in Brayden’s case, he got home from six weeks on a boat and was required to report to work the next morning at seven am. He messaged us early in the morning to announce that his car starter had died and he was walking to work. Thanos felt vengeful about cars, in general, and smote his friend’s car as well. But that wasn’t enough, so he struck down Grant’s starter in Pennsylvania. As you can tell, Thanos has investments in the aftermarket repair industry.
With that out of the way, Thanos decided everyone should act like there was a full moon even though we were still in a waxing phase. Brayden called us while we were driving home from dinner.
“So I need to swear you all to secrecy cuz if Lu finds out I called you about this, she might flip out,” he said.
“Okay,” I said.
“She thinks we should handle stuff like this ourselves. I’m just kind of looking for perspective.”
I’ll spare you the details, but the short version is that one of Brayden’s roommates announced that he was kicking everyone out of the apartment . . . and also that the rent had been raised and everyone owed him an extra $160 (you’re right, those two things don’t go together, but I didn’t react to a mostly full moon, the roommate did). And our short advice was along the lines of, “Just call your landlord and see if this guy has had any conversations with him at all.”
The next afternoon, Lucia called each of us separately to update us. “So Brayden confessed that he called you all. Dad, you’ll never believe this,” she started. “Brayden called base housing, and they knew nothing at all about this guy breaking the lease, kicking Brayden and his other roommate out. Like, he totally lied about everything.”
“I mean, that’s exactly why Mom and I said to call the landlord.”
“It’s absolutely crazy!”
After the calls, Lucia texted us and apologized for having to ask us to help. “Nothing to apologize for,” I said. “Happy to help.” Come on, Lu. Mom and I aren’t ready to be put out to pasture just yet.
Meanwhile, back in Pennsylvania, Grant texted to say, “Well, today is a big day for character growth.”
“Why is that? Cuz you have no car?”
“Have to figure out how to do everything until the car is fixed.”
He had had to walk to Bucknell at 5:30 am to arrive in time for his football lift. Then, he talked someone from work into giving him a ride to his client’s house after which he had to grab an Uber to the repair shop.
“I called the office yesterday to tell them the car was in the shop, and they said, ‘Oh, okay. We’ll try to cancel those shifts,'” he wrote. “And I said, ‘No, no, no, no, no, that’s not what I’m saying at all. I’m just looking for a ride to work.’ So we got that worked out. Cuz when you have car repair bills, you can’t be taking days off of work and not getting paid.”
Back in Hawaii, Brayden confronted his roommate with the evidence of his duplicity, which his roommate handled with great maturity, calling Brayden crazy and someone who has “barracks mentality,” whatever that is. So Brayden and Lucia are in the process of arranging new housing on base, which they hope will be available next week some time. In the meantime, Brayden is sleeping with the door locked in the event that a werewolf comes out at night.
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