iPhone – Never Short On Words

Angela looked at her iPhone. Ten minutes till midnight. That meant Monday was almost over. She began to run down the stairs.

“Wait, don’t go,” cried Kyle. “I don’t know how to get a hold of you.”

Angela looked back, but only for a minute. “I’ll call you,” she said. “I’ve got to go.”

Soon she was on the street. She waved for her ride to pick her up. “Come on, come on,” Angela said. The limo slowly glided to a stop in front of her. The driver’s door swung open and the chauffer got out, but Angela opened her own door. “Never mind that, we’ve got to go! She can land any minute now.”

“Yes my lady,” the chauffer said.

Angela dove into the back seat and slammed the door behind her. “Drive man, drive like your job depends on it,” Angela said. The chauffer did as he was told and accelerated away from the curb, pushing Angela into the back seat. “Damn it!” she cried.

The chauffer began to slow. “Did I not do well my lady?”

Angela straightened herself up onto the seat. “You’re fine. I just left one of my shoes behind.”

“Would you like me to circle around?” asked the chauffer.

“Are you kidding me? Do you want to get paid?” Angela said.

The chauffer didn’t respond in words, but his acceleration told Angela that her point had gotten across. Angela watched the city zip by. She checked her iPhone again. Just five more minutes till midnight. Five more minutes of the dream, or at least that’s what Angela had been told by her godmother. The old woman would be landing pretty soon.

The neighborhood began to look more familiar. Angela tapped her foot in anticipation. She watched the time tick by oh so slowly, but with the inevitability of a death row sentence. Angela’s house soon came into view and Angela’s heart skipped a beat. She just might make it. She still had one minute, and maybe the plane would be late. Angela poked through her purse and pulled out her gold credit card.

The chauffer pulled into her driveway. Angela thrust the card through the window. “Quick, run it,” she said.

The chauffer put the card through his system. Angela watched her phone, waiting for the numbers to switch. The machine in the front dash began to print a receipt. “Yes!” shouted Angela.

The chauffer shook his head. “No my lady, it was denied,” he said.

“What?” asked Angela. Her iPhone began to buzz. It was midnight. “I beat her. Why didn’t it work?”

There was a tap on Angela’s window. She pushed the button to lower her window and standing there was her godmother. “Angela Penelope Cinderella! What the hell do you think you’re doing?” her godmother asked.

Angela got out of the limo and stomped her shoeless foot. “You keep telling me to live my dream,” Angela said. “So I got out there and lived a bit.”

The driver’s side window lowered. “Ladies, I would like to get paid tonight and go home,” he said.

Angela’s godmother took a card out of her pocket and handed it to the chauffer. “Here, run this,” she said. She then turned to Angela again. “How much is your life going to cost me tonight?”

“Why are you home? You should be just getting into the airport,” Angela said.

“I took the early flight home,” her godmother said. “And you didn’t answer my question.”

The limo driver held out the receipt and a pen. “Can you sign this madam?”

Angela’s godmother took the piece of paper and put scribbled out a signature. She then noticed the tip line and wrote in something. When she handed it back to the chauffer, his eyebrows rose quite a bit. “Thank you madam,” he said.

“You had to put up with her tonight,” Angela’s godmother said. “Consider it combat pay.”

“Really, combat pay?” asked Angela. She stomped her bare foot again and caught a stone. “Ouch,” she said, as she fell onto her backside in the grass.

The chauffer put the limo in reverse. “Good luck my lady,” he said to Angela as he scrolled up the window and backed out the driveway.

Angela watched her last moments of freedom glided down the road. “Why did you come home early?” Angela asked while she rubbed her sore foot.

Her godmother walked over to where Angela sat. “Your step sisters called me when they caught whiff of what you were going to try,” she said. Her godmother finally noticed Angela’s lack of a shoe. “Where did you lose your…” Her godmother paused as she realized what Angela was wearing. “Where did you lose MY Jimmy Choo?”

Angela looked up at the godmother and cracked a tired smile. “Boy, have I got a fairy tale to tell you.”