The Chosen One I live with turned into a liability. I was tainted by association with the human mosquito magnet. Whilst helping Jimmy to back the car onto the trailer hitch, I signaled two hand gestures back, one slap, three karate chops, one more back gesture, two windmills, a stop gesture and a clap. He’d no idea what to do so he gave up and laughed at me – not helpful. We changed places.
The mosquitoes went into attack mode when they saw Jimmy which was quite funny until they followed me in to the driver’s seat. How did they know that was his side? They hummed all around the door seal ready to hop in with the driver, in this case me. The action of opening the door sucked the mosquitoes inside the car. They knew this would happen. It was part of their insidious plan. Jimmy was highly amused to see my gyrations inside the car – clapping and slapping, whirling round, twisting and stretching for that last mozzie just out of reach. He was lucky my foot didn’t slip off the brake or I would have run him down.
When I had decimated the mosquito population zinging round my head and Jimmy had hitched up the trailer I phoned him from inside the car, “Don’t get in the driver’s seat. There are dozens of them outside the driver’s window. Shake your jacket and jump in the passenger seat. I’ll drive to the trash cans. Maybe we can . . . .”
He’d hung up on me and was making a beeline for the passenger door.
“Shake your jacket. Shake it! Shake it!”
A dozen mosquitoes were on his back and I kept the doors locked. I didn’t want him dragging them into the car. “SHAKE YOUR BACK!” I shrieked through the glass not wanting to unlock the door for him as he gave me a wild imploring look.
“OPEN THE DOOR!”
“SHAKE YOUR JACKET!”
“LET ME IN!”
“NOOO!”
He snapped off his jacket and I unlocked the door for him. He snatched the door open and leapt in. There were still hoards of mosquitoes outside “his” window on the driver’s side and none outside “mine” on the passenger side and no more in the car so between us we’d outwitted them. On the rear window behind the driver’s seat, two mosquitoes have been immortalized by the palm of my hand. I left them there as a warning to others that dare to cross my path.
We had been driven ever so slightly mad. As much as he hated to, Jimmy covered up as much as he could in hot weather, from cap to sock, and spritzed any exposed skin with his new Avon scent. We twitched and clapped spasmodically, trying to kill things that were just floaters in our peripheral vision. Dust motes were dealt with harshly. We slapped and stung ourselves and each other and pinged our hands on the windows of the car only to discover that the mosquitoes were outside. They flew off complacently and unharmed.
Jimmy scratched his bites. I scratched at the thought of them.
Which Way Now 101 