Writing Exercise: Affluenza

Writing Club

April 19, 2016

This prompt was one word: Affluenza.  Write something about "affluenza."  Affluence + Influenza. Of course, the description leans itself to a darker bent.  It was a word I had never heard of before and I wasn't alone.  There's more to the definition, but our group tended towards the meaning as very privileged individuals with wealthy backgrounds struggling to differentiate between right and wrong due to their upbringing.  

Writing Prompt:  "Affluenza"
Time allotted: 20 minutes

-lack of motivation

-feelings of guilt  (not so much with Carl in the story below)

-sense of isolation 
(some of the descriptors that came out of our group's discussion of the word)

A cool chill made Carl open just one eye to confirm that it was Connie, step mommy number 5, barely a decade older than he was, standing in the way of the sun.  Carl lazily waved a hand for her to move to the left.  Her shadow remained. 

“Aren’t you suppose to be in class right now?”  Her perky voice irritated the heck out of him. 

“I’m suspended.  So nope.”  Carl pulled his ball cap over his face, hoping she would walk away.  Her annoying shadow remained. 

What his dad had seen in this one, he had no idea.  She wasn’t even a red head.  All but Carl’s mom had been a red head.  And the worst of it was this one had been Dad’s nurse.  Connie was always in his face nattering about something.  She got Dad back on his feet after his heart attack and playing tennis and eating nothing but lettuce.

If it was going to be a stand off, Connie would be standing all day.  She wasn’t going to change the way Carl rolled.  He had no plans on moving except maybe to flip over and and get a decent tan on his back.

After 5 minutes, he felt the warmth of the sun return.  Good.  There was the creak of the tap.  Connie was going to water her stupid roses.  Why she insisted on doing it herself, Carl couldn’t understand.  They paid a gardener for that. 

A cold spray of water pelted him out of the blue.  Connie had turned the hose on him.  “You are going to get up and do something.” She squeaked like the faucet.  “Go study for god’s sake.  Go make use of that new computer you insisted on and get your project done.” 

Something snapped inside Carl’s head.  He leapt out of the lawn chair and shoved his nuisance into the pool, hose and all.  As he rammed her into the deep end, the hose tangled around her legs.  He almost found it humorous the way Connie was waving her arms and blubbering.  “Glub, Glub!  Swim Mermaid!”

Carl lay back down in his chair and put his cap over his face wishing Connie would just shut up.  Her flailing splashed his t-shirt.  Carl got up and dragged his chair from the pool deck to the lawn.  After a few minutes the noise had settled down.  After his nap, Carl would find out if mermaids could swim.  If not, oh well, maybe step mommy 6 would be better.