Addiction

The day started a little blandly. At eight o'clock in the morning, the white hot heat was already an issue. The thermometer hanging on the outside of her Beach House read 84 degrees, but with that all-important heat index needle buried way at the right side of 100%, the term coined by the local News and Weather Geniuses in the Midwest, the "feels-like" temperature, was reading 99 degrees.

She was feeling a little sluggish. The window unit air conditioner was running in the dining room, to at least try to thwart the "feel-like" temperature inside the house somewhat, keeping it at a crisp, cool 83 degrees, but when she walked out the back door, onto the patio, and peeked at the electricity meter spinning wildly out of control, she ran screaming back inside and turned it off, hoping to reap the benefits of at least the lower humidity level inside for twenty minutes, long enough to save herself about five bucks on the utility bill.

Work was going rather slowly, her fingers sticking to the keys, when she remembered her stash in the fridge. Her eyes lit up, her heart raced a little. Her addiction awaited her in the kitchen, and she made a point of putting off retrieving her little reward, trying to make it seem even more exciting after the hour-long anticipation.

When she could no longer stand it, she jumped up and sauntered to the refrigerator, slowly pulled the door open. She nearly had to put on sunglasses to protect her eyes from the glow she perceived there, the bright sun-like light causing the kitchen to seem absolutely heavenly from its rays! Slowly, she reached in, wrapped her hand around a cold, shapely bottle of Coca-Cola Blak, caressed it against her cheek, was within seconds of making love to it on the kitchen floor before finally unscrewing the cap and pouring it ceremoniously into a large mug full of ice.

Music was playing all around her as she hurried back to her office and tipped the cold glass to her lips. The first sip was, she was certain, like stepping into the Kingdom of Heaven. Her eyes lit up, a smile formed on her lips, her heat-reddened face cooled instantly, and then she gulped, only slightly aware of the fact that these little six-ounce bottles of pure carbonated caffeine were going to finally eat up her paychecks, that she was going to need more and more to keep her alive.

After consuming one, she almost went for a second, but at the last minute, her heart rate increased to about 120, her pupils became huge! She could see the light! She could type twice her normal rate, could hear sounds she never heard! She could hear the ching-ching of the cash register ringing up this little beauty at a whopping $2.00 a bottle! And when she realized that the sounds were her ears ringing, she closed the refrigerator door and made the decision that a conscious effort to consume only one Coca-Cola Blak per day would be her goal.

A toast to fusion drinks. A toast to caffeine. Feeling like this, she headed to her employer to ask for a raise to cover her new habit.

Everything worth being addicted to is expensive. GOOD MORNING WORLD!