Read People I Want to Punch in the Throat for Free Online Page A

because my house was such a pain for her to clean and she was trying to let me down easy?
    When I told the Hubs about Rosa, he immediately went to number five on my list. “Nice job, Jen. You ran her off,” he said.
    “Me?”
    “Yes, you. You never do a good enough job cleaning up for her, and it makes more work for her. And I heard you ask her last time she was here if she ever vacuums behind the dryer.”
    “Well …”
    “That was probably the straw that broke her back.”
    “Shit. So you don’t think she’s in St. Louis?”
    “No way. Call Marci and ask if she dumped them, too.”
    “I can’t. What if Marci has no idea what I’m talking about? Then she’ll know Rosa fired us. I’ll be so embarrassed.”
    “You should be embarrassed. After all these years, Rosa had enough of you. She fired us. Now what are we going to do?”
    “I don’t know. I’ll have to find someone else. Maybe Teri can give me that list of the ones she fired.”
    “Well, you better do something fast. I don’t want to go to marriage counseling.”
    I spent the next couple of weeks searching for a new cleaning lady. I couldn’t find anyone who clicked with me like Rosa did. Even though I was long past my breast-feeding days, every time I interviewed a potential candidate all I could think was, “Would I let this woman grab my naked boob?”
    I was starting to get worried—I’d even created a board on Pinterest I called “Marriage Vow Renewal Ideas”—when one day my phone rang. “Hello?” I answered.
    “Jen?” a familiar voice asked.
    “Rosa?”
    “Yes, it’s me, Jen. How are you?”
    “I’m not good, Rosa. How are you?”
    “I’m not good, either. I miss you.”
    “I miss you, too.”
    “I hate St. Louis.”
    “Oh. So you really did move there?”
    “Of course I did, Jen. Did you think I didn’t?”
    “It doesn’t matter now, Rosa. You were saying you hate St. Louis.…”
    “Yes. And the kids hate St. Louis.”
    “Oh.” I felt a little tingle. If Rosa hates it and the kids hate it, maybe …
    “Javier hates St. Louis.”
    Yes! I tried to play it cool. She’d hurt me, but I didn’t want her to know. “Oh.”
    “I come Saturday, Jen?”
    Oh please God, yes . “Saturday would work for me, Rosa.”
    “I can clean behind the fridge now. I know you like that.”
    “No!” I cried. I’d just gotten her back—I didn’t want to rock the boat with outrageous demands and risk losing her again. “We’ll just stick with your usual routine, Rosa. Just do what you do best.”
    “Okay, Jen. I see you Saturday.”
    “Rosa …”
    “Yes, Jen?”
    I hesitated. Could I really say it? How could I not say it? I had lost her and now she was back. Had I learned nothing from all of those “Can This Marriage Be Saved?” articles I’d been using as makeshift marriage counseling for the Hubs and me during her absence? Rule number one: tell your loved one what they mean to you—out loud and often. “Rosa, I love you.”
    “I know, Jen.”

With our cleaning lady situation locked down and our marital bliss revived, the Hubs and I headed into our first summer in Kansas. I’d recently started a new job at a large company selling office equipment. We didn’t know too many people who weren’t related to me, and we were looking to branch out and meet some new people, so when Maryanne, a woman in my office, invited us to her Fourth of July party, I accepted.
    “Remind me again: how do you know this woman?” the Hubs asked as he drove to Maryanne’s house and I balanced a tray of deviled eggs on my lap.
    “We work together. She’s in the cubicle next to me. I can always hear her on the phone wheeling and dealing. She has a lot of big accounts. It seems like every day she’s selling truckloads of Aeron chairs while I’m struggling to get my clients to pull the trigger on a box of staples.”
    “Hmm. Okay. And you’re sure we can see the fireworks from her house?” The Hubs is a bit of a