The Storage Space would have screamed with pain when its front door was slammed open against the wall, if only a building could…
Why was it deigning to think in human terms again? Why could it not free itself forever from even the last vestige of association with those wretched, vulgar creatures? Why couldn’t it concentrate solely on objects with dignity, id est inanimate?
The Storage Space thought of art, that upstart Claude Monet’s multiple paintings during different seasons of that bridge in Giverny. It thought of architecture, that oddly sensuous new movement also coming out of France: Art Nouveau.
It thought about how it could be argued that all these inanimate objects might in some vague way be associated with humans. Such an insidious consideration was firmly swept aside.
“May I help you?”
That beautiful voice. Human! Well, yes, but some humans were…at least tolerable.
“Hey, sup?”
Unlike others.
“I beg your pardon?”
Amelia of the beautiful voice. But did the Storage Space detect a hint in her voice of the revulsion it shared?
“I beg pardon,” the intolerable other mimicked. “How are you this fine day?”
“Fine, thank you, young man. That’s an awful lot of suitcases, even for a storage space. You…believe in quick getaways?”
“Really!”
Another voice, forced high and dreadful, along with all the speaker’s pink hair.
“Fifi…you know this guy?”
The pregnant teenager’s father, with his arm around this…Fifi creature.
“I’m so innocent. Really!” Fifi protested, squirming within his embrace. “Rainbow Shoes, here, with all the suitcases? I was just talking to him on the street when I was waiting in your car while you took care of… What’s your daughter’s name? Really! I just can’t remember these things.”
“Imogene. I can’t help it if it took a while. My wife beat her up again.”
“But isn’t Emily, Imelda, Whoever in the hospital now? Really! I remember that! So what are we doing back here?”
“Nothing you need to worry your pretty pink head about, so you wait here.”
