I tried to sleep but it was hard. I had Jewel, the woman I should be with on my mind. I also had Ester the woman I should definitely not be with lurking in the back of my mind. When I finally nodded off to sleep, Ester won again.

The memory of her and that damn video fought for a space in my sleep. My brain had a love hate relationship with her. I was helpless to cleanse her from my dreams. She again invaded my helpless mind with flashing images from that video. It was insanity, but they were also hypnotically gripping. I had seen pornography equally as offense, and some even worse. I never had the same helpless gut level reaction to those images.

The sound of my cell phone pulled me from a different image. One that was not of Ester but of the trailer. I did have hundreds of images run though my dreams nightly.

“Hello.” I said.

“Larry help me please,” Ester’s voice begged.

I pulled the phone away from my face, then looked at it before I spoke. “Do you realize it’s almost three thirty AM?” I asked.

“Yes, I haven’t slept a wink,” she replied. “I’m so worried,”

“What it your emergency,” I asked.

“I have to do something. Earl has lost his mind.” she said.

“What makes you think that?” I asked.

“He has me doing all these things, he sees in porno movies,” she said.

“I see. To be honest Ester you need to talk to a professional about this. I’m really not qualified to advise you,” I said. What I really wanted to say was why the fuck are you bothering me with this shit. “My only advice would be to get away and stay away from him.”

“Larry, he is my son. I can’t do that,” she said.

“Of course you can. Put his shit on the street, and change the locks,” I said. “Whether you can stick to it is something else.”

“Can I send you a file dump. I have some things I might need as evidence. I don’t want them to get lost,” She said.

“You have my email, or do you want my snail mail?” I asked.

“I think I’ll be able to send some digital. Some I want to send through the U.S. mail,” she answered.

“Okay I’ll hold them for you as long as I can. If you change your mind, you come for them yourself. I will not turn them over to any third parties,” I explained.

“I understand, and thank you,” were her last words.

I had no idea what the call was really about, so I had played along. I had no idea what I had gotten myself involved into. “Anything was possible with the crazy ass Ester,” I said to no one and laughed. I lay awake for what seemed like hours wondering what would be in the packages.

Sometime in the night I drifted off to sleep since I woke up cold. It was a combination of things. I had kicked off the covers in the night, and the furnace was set too low. My furnace didn’t have a thermostat per-say. It had number settings. I had to know how to set it based on an educated guesses. As often happened, I had guessed wrong the night before.

Jed didn’t mind the cold, but I was forced to dress in at least the first layer of my clothes before I put him out. I stood at the back door in a pair of larger than necessary jeans, a thermal undershirt and a short sleeve cotton tee shirt. I had read somewhere that the short sleeve tee combo helped maintain the core body temperature. I knew only that it freed my arms. Since there was less bulk at my elbow, it made working easier. Since I was still adjusting the trailer, that was a good thing.

When Jed came in, I felt how cold the air was. It was really cold even in March, which was often the case. It didn’t mean that life stopped. It just got a later start in my case.

It was 9AM before I even got out of bed. That was due to my poor night’s sleep. Since Jed rushed out the door, I knew he wasn’t happy about it either. Once Jed was busy with his breakfast, I had a bowl of bran cereal with dried raisins and blue berries. I made a note that I needed to stop by the Deli at Walmart for more muffins. They were an easier breakfast and even traveled better than cereal.

I checked to see if Jed needed to go out after his breakfast. When I asked him, he said no. Since I had nothing else to do I got my phone. Looking at the phone reminded me of the middle of the night call. I decided to do my best to forget it, since I couldn’t do anything till the packages arrived.

I set my laptop on the kitchen table, plugged on the exterior power supply, then poured another cup of coffee. I could put it off no longer, so I called two welding shops. The both wanted a minimum of fifty bucks to even turn their torch on. I decided that I could manage the alteration to the mountain bike with J B Weld.

The only issue with the bike’s adaptation that need any kind of weld was the trailer adapter. It was really held in place by the axle bolt. There was a possibility that the adapter could case the volt to vibrate loose. I needed to secure it to the frame. The JB Weld should hold it in place well enough. If and when I ever bought a machine and learned to weld, I’d do a better job.

In the meantime I needed to buy the JB Weld. Since I had the note on the table to go to Walmart, I decided that it would be a perfect time to combine the epoxy with the muffins and milk purchase. Actually I had a few other things to purchase. I estimated the bulk and weight requirements of my shopping trip. Once I had that in mind, I decided I wouldn’t need the trailer at all, so Jed’s crate could remain under it’s tarp.

“Don’t worry old son, We can go for a walk this afternoon,” I said.

I actually toyed with the idea of hanging my purchases on the handle bars. If I did that I could use the two wheeler. Then I though of pushing the two wheeler in case of a breakdown. I just didn’t trust it as much as the scooter at the time.