Feral Accountants

A response to Tom Cheney's comic in the March 29th issue of the New Yorker: An exterminator looks up at a woman in a bathrobe on her porch while underneath the porch cower men with briefcases and ties. The exterminator says, "You have a nest of feral accountants under your porch."

Mike found Kathy in the basement where she balanced on top of a box of books and held one of those plastic bins filled with shredded papers over the air exchanger's intake manifold. "Whatcha doing?"

"Working on our taxes."

Taxes? Mike worried that an IRS audit would soon be in their future. It might make him forget the debacle with the clothes-eating Wong industries washer/dryer combo. That wasn't necessarily a good thing. He decided he didn't want to know more about what she was doing. "That's nice dear. I'm heading to bed."

###

Mike awoke to a chittering noise, at least he'd slept through the shrieks as Kathy drove to work in her Sidhe car. He lifted a slat in the blinds. The sun shone on their green lawn, he was going to have to mow it soon, but he couldn't see what made the noise.

He grabbed a robe and walked out on the porch. The noise was louder outside, like a crowd all speaking over each other. It seemed to come from right under his feet, spooked he walked into the yard. Underneath the porch hunkered men wearing suits and ties as they traded little bits of shredded paper. They mumbled with white flecks of paper caught in their wiry hair. He hoped they had their shots. The last thing he needed was a severe case of accountantism.