A CHANGE OF PACE... some time off (Part 136g)

A CHANGE OF PACE... some time off (Part 136g)

I headed back to the house wanting to tell Sabrina what I’d discovered. It wasn’t even 6am. I went up to one of the windows in the den where she was sleeping and knocked on it a few times. Finally, a sleepy eyed Bebe pulled the drape back. I told her to wake Sabrina and for the two of them to meet me at the back door. It took a while but when they appeared they both looked like they hadn’t slept all that much. Sabrina’s first words were to ask if I’d been over to her house. When she did I sort of winced realizing that I could’ve gone into the house to seek out the smell while they were asleep and also taken a look for and at Bebe's panties, but didn’t. I wanted to kick myself. Then I told them I had something to show them and headed for my back yard. Sabrina questioned why we weren’t going over to her place but all I did was to wave them onward.

When I pointed towards the remains of the tree I could hear one of them gasp. They, almost in unison, asked what had happened. I, in turn, asked if they hadn’t heard the “explosion”. The looks on their faces was of complete puzzlement. I’d assumed that they’d been home after they told me that their boyfriends were off fishing. Sabrina then said they’d gone to the movies and the lights had gone out. She said the audience waited until someone told them they could get refunds and then they came home. They saw the tree debris on the roads and a limb of one partially blocking the driveway and had no idea why. Not wanting to put scratches in her father’s T-Bird Sabrina left it at the bottom of the driveway. She said that when she unlocked the kitchen door and stepped inside she smelled the strange odor. Bebe added that she followed her inside but told her it was a good idea not to go any further. Sabrina said she came right over to my house but no one was home so they went back to the T-Bird and waited until they saw the headlights turning into my driveway.

Now it was I who was puzzled about the smell that had upset them. We made our way though the debris in Sabrina’s back yard to her back porch and once there I asked if they wanted to join me inside. They both shook theirs heads in a negative fashion and I just smiled. They’d left the door unlocked so as I opened it I could smell something I couldn't place. I remembered what Bebe had said about her brother working with metal and the smell from it. It didn’t seem too bad in the kitchen and as I walked towards the front of the house it seemed to go away. Returning to the kitchen I saw the door to the cellar and opened it. WOW!

We still didn’t have electricity and there was no way that I was venturing down those steps without a light. I returned to the two women who were standing at the base of the steps to the porch and told them I knew where the smell came from but had no idea what it was or what caused it. I suggested that we all go back to my house to get Elle and the girls were up and get a bite to eat. I knew I’d have to get batteries for my flashlight but it wasn’t even 7am so I’d have to wait until the hardware store opened at 8am. Entertaining Sabrina for that amount of time would be a chore I could do without so suggested that they could kill time playing with my kids until I got the batteries and perused the cellar.

Power was still out all through the village. There had to have been at least a dozen people lined up at the door to the store. By the time I got in all the regular size batteries were gone (They didn’t come in multiples and in bubble packs back in those days). I asked the owner if he had any suggestions and he pointed me to an almost empty shelf. There was one battery operated lantern left and when I looked at the price I almost choked. It was around $8. I took it and headed home, now anxious to see what was awaiting me in Sabrina’s cellar.

On my way back I decided to by-pass the women and drove past my house and up in behind Sabrina’s T-Bird. It was the only way I’d get to Bebe’s room without her knowing. I knew there was no way that they could’ve seen me drive by and by doing this I could make a quick trip up the stairs, do my search without worrying. Even though I knew there was little chance any of them could see me in Sabrina’s yard I stayed close to the house and pulled myself up onto the porch without using the stairs. I felt like a burglar. By the time I was inside my heart was pounding and the sweat was running down my brow. Taking the stairs two at a time I was in the room in seconds. It was the first time I’d seen it since they had added other furniture other than the bed. There was no other way to describe it but spartan. There was a five drawer dresser, a small table with a lamp next to the bed and a small upholstered chair that looked entirely out of place. I only took a few seconds before going for the top drawer of the dresser. There were three different types of items... socks, bras and panties. The first thing I noticed about the panties was that there were two groups of them, one in front of the other. There were only a couple in the front and they were just kind of stuffed in. The pile in the back was neatly folded and I thought I saw a price tag still attached. I reached in and pulled it out. They were bikini’s, just like the ones I’d seen (and felt) on our clothes line not too long before. They were also nylon satin tricot, my favorite. The paper price tag read ‘Gimbel’s’ and was 89 cents. But the best part was they were made by Modern Globe, the manufacturer of the panties Elle and I’d used to make ‘dribble panties’ for both Ginger and Sandy. Holding them up there was something else. Of all the bikinis I'd seen these had the biggest crotch, front to back, that I'd ever seen. Just holding them up in front of me I could visualize the VPL they would give off. I tried to remember seeing one on Bebe but couldn't come up with one. I thought that strange at first but then realized that the most time I'd been around Bebe was when we were racing the car and that was before she'd bought these. The thought of a nice VPL had me thinking that maybe I should try to introduce Elle to bikinis. Since I knew where I’d gotten the Modern Globe satin briefs I pretty much knew where I could go locally to get some... and if they didn’t have them there was a Gimbel’s department store at the relatively new shopping mall (and the first in the county) about an hour to the West. If I were to guess I’d say I was in the room for no more than three or four minutes. Excited about my 'find' I ran down the stairs and headed for the cellar.

That was another shock. When I got to the bottom step I was about choking and there was a kind of  a hazy cloud hanging about four feet off the floor. I shone the light around the whole place but when the beam hit the electric panel I pretty much had my answer as to the source of the smell and the haze. It was all blackened and when I got closer I could see that some of the exposed wires had melted and that all the fuses were blackened. The wood that the panel was attached to was also charred. It came to me that it was only by some miracle that it hadn’t caught completely on fire.

Returning to my house and Sabrina I told her of my findings. A blank stare was all I got in return. It was Bebe who asked what she should do and I didn't really have a ready answer.

To be continued...