The Tunnel of Mismatched Socks

“Who comes up with these names?” I asked Chaz as I followed him through the dark tunnel.

“The places name themselves, I think,” Chaz said after a few moments.

He was carrying a lantern, which made him easy to follow.  The reflection through his glass-like body was pretty cool and I was definitely staring more than I should.  I still got a good view of my surroundings.

It looks like a cross between a dryer and a fun house tunnel.  The height of the rounded ceiling was anywhere from two feet to ten, depending on the piles of socks.  It was the first time I had ever gone caving through laundry.

Not just any laundry, but socks.  Every kind of sock imaginable was strewn all over the place: knee-highs, anklets, crew-cuts, and even half a pantyhose.  The scent of the tunnel was a cross between every kind of fabric softener ever created and a hint of mildew.  It seemed that not all of the socks had been stolen from the dryer.

“What are we looking for again?”

“An hour of Christmas Day,” Chaz explained again.

“Can you go back to square one?” I asked.  “Or at least give me the Reader’s Digest version?”

“Um, I’ll try again,” Chaz mumbled as he thought about it.

“See if you can do it in five sentences,” I challenged.  “I’ve got a short attention span.”

Chaz laughed and underneath the chuckle was the warble of crystal glasses.  He thought about it for several minutes as we climbed over pink socks that were formerly white.  I know he had explained it all to me the night before, but I definitely wasn’t paying attention then.

“Well,” Chaz said thoughtfully.  “Here’s my best attempt.  One, thieves tried to steal Christmas Day and nearly succeeded, but the scuffle ended up scattering the time.  Two, we need to gather the twenty-four hours before Christmas Day or there will be no Christmas.  Three, um, the hours are powerful and can be problematic if left alone which is why we need to get them now.  Four.  Well, um, four is that I think that’s it.”

“If you can find the hours, than why do you need me?” I asked.

“The hours are corrupted,” Chaz explained.  “I can’t touch them.  You, as the Finder, have the power to restore it.”

“You do realize that I’m going to ask you all this again.”

Chaz laughed, but didn’t have time to do much else.  The sea of socks became just that, a rolling sea.  A shifting wave rocked us to our knees and for a brief moment, the light faded as Chaz dropped the lantern.  He quickly recovered it and we quickly regained our bearings in the sock infested cave.

“Are you all right?” Chaz asked.

“Aside from being in a dryer, I’m peachy keen,” I teased.

There was a loud clang and everything shifted again.  “Oh,” Chaz said, as if he realized something.

“Don’t tell me it’s turning on.”

“Then I won’t,” Chaz stated matter-of-factly.

“Shoot,” I grumbled.

I was going to ask if we could just leave, but a tube sock suddenly whipped out of the ground and snatched away our lantern.  A pile of legwarmers ate up the light and swallowed us up in darkness.  We waited in silence for a few moments and then a soft glow kicked in, like the backup lights in a bus: enough light to provide outlines but not enough for clear definition.

“It’s an hour,” Chaz said quietly.  “Not good.  It can move through the ground.”

“So,” I sighed, “we’re about to get strangled by hose in a rotating dryer.”

“Personally, I think I’d prefer ankle socks.”

I laughed as Chaz helped me stand up while the tunnel began an excruciatingly slow rotation.  It would certainly speed up, but for now we could stay on top.  The longer it took to retrieve the hour, the longer we would be stuck in the dryer.  Obviously the sock monster of mismatched laundry had intelligence.  This was going to be a wild ride.