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Westlake Short Story

Decent Essays

It happened quickly. One day, Lori and I were talking – dreaming – and we came to the conclusion that a house was in order. Now, this wouldn’t be an unrealistic aspiration for most people. But most people have money when they consider making such a purchase. I did have a string of good luck and had booked a bunch of commercials, but... A friend told us about a little development in Westlake Village. The suburbs. I had never heard of it. (I mean, I knew of suburbs, I just didn’t know of Westlake.) It was only about thirty miles away. We took a drive, looked, and by the end of the week, we purchased a home. Of course, we had to borrow a small fortune from a good friend for the down payment. But as we would later say, we didn’t seek out Westlake, we were led there. Sure, it was far from the beach, the life-giving …show more content…

For the first time in our married existence, we had a driveway in which to park. When you’ve gone without such things, you REALLY appreciate them. For a while, we boasted and bragged about our newfound freedom of being able to drive to the store and return and not have to spend a half hour looking for a place to park within a few blocks of home. Lori felt she was living the life of luxury: her own washer, dryer, dishwasher, and all able to run at the same time! (Did that just sound like a 1950’s commercial?) So this, we thought, was what living a grown-up life was all about. Lori immediately went to work at getting John, His Most Handsome Holiness, enrolled at the local Catholic grade school. John longed to be at a school where he could share and learn of his faith. To this day, I am convinced that John was placed on this earth to teach of faith and love. What started out as bad news – the school didn’t have room for our son – turned into good news the day before first grade was to begin, when the school surprised Lori with a phone call.
“You’re not going to believe this, Mrs. Sikorra!” Oh no.

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