Borrowing

Written 55-D18 [2023-10-30], Edited 55-D18 [2023-10-30]

Image credit: Twitter Twemoji

Man, that’s going to be expensive, I thought while staring at the shelves of headsets. The Best Buy was closing, and I had to decide.

I looked briefly at my account balance in my bank app. I could easily pay for the noise-cancelling headset out of my chequing account, so long as for the next week I didn’t pay for any incidental purchases, food, or my next electrical bill.

But there was always the other option. A yes. The credit card. The key to material bliss was in my hands, and the only immediate consequence would be some numbers going up.

Nah, can’t have any more debt, I thought. It will take me years to pay back already.

But I wanted the headset. I knew I wanted the Sony headset because it was exactly the same as my existing device. The only difference being that my existing device was snapped in half.

OK forget the time, what if I can’t pay my rent? I thought.

But even though I hadn’t put on the headset yet, the siren song of the industry-leading noise cancelling technology beckoned me. The song’s lyrics went something like this: You’ll just put your rent on your credit card too. Just borrowing a little extra from your future self.

OK, forget the rent, what would Mom think? I thought.

“Hello, can I help you?” Asked one of the sales clerks.

“Can I go home now?” I asked the sales clerk.

“Oh sure,” he said. “But before you go, have you considered our special Halloween offer on the Bose surround sound home theatre system for just $2999?”

Notes

This was written in 15 minutes during a Joy of Writing meetup.

Feedback from The Joy of Writing group

• The use of branding in writing has advantages and disadvantages
  • including branding can make the scenario feel real
  • including branding can show a character’s obsession (maybe not in this story)
  • avoiding branding can make the story more timeless
  • I used “Sony” because I couldn’t spell “Sennheiser”