Work

The next day Margaret got up at 6:00 AM to go to her crap job at the coffee shop. Intermittent sexual powers or no, she still needed to earn money for college. The pay was lousy, but so was the coffee. "Some day," Margaret promised herself yet again, "I'll be out of here." She glanced at the ring. If she could figure out how to get it to work consistently, that day might come a lot sooner than she'd expected.

The first customers of the day broke her reverie. "Oh, darn!" said the redhead, "I left my purse in the car." She shrugged and pirouetted to show that there was no place for a wallet on her green and white polka-dot dress.

"I've got it, Mindy," the blonde assured her, pulling a twenty out of her jeans. "Two lattes, no fat, extra sweet," she ordered, placing the bill on the counter.

Margaret plastered a professionally friendly smile on her face and rang up the order. "Great," she thought. It was Doris Maddox and Mindy Doyle -- "DM" and "MD" had been queen bees since Junior high, giggling barbie dolls ruling a roost of bland conformists, cheerfully stomping out any signs of independent thought or deviation. They never actively bullied. They just ignored you, and saw to it that other people ignored you too if they wanted to get invited to the good parties.

As she made the coffees she imagined DM and MD's initials carved into a tree. Wouldn't it be something if those fine church-going young ladies weren't just BFFs, but lovers? The ring pulsed....