"The whole set? By this afternoon? Yes, ma'am!"
The woman nodded cheerily as evidenced by the smile on her face.
"Yes, ma'am. I'll have the whole set delivered by this afternoon. I'm sure that you'll enjoy your new smart furniture. By the way, where did you hear about our product?"
"A neighbor of mine recommended your furniture to me. Said she loved it." Melissa said softly, "She couldn't live a normal life without it."
***
Melissa was glad to see the furniture van drive up before her husband arrived home from work as she wanted to surprise him. The van backed up carefully into the driveway. Then the door was opened and a lift rose into place. One by one, the furniture pieces walked to the waiting lift and were lowered to the ground. Once there, they waited until the van driver led them to the house.
"Sign here, ma'am."
Melissa signed for the furniture, then stepped out of the way as the van driver held the door open so the furniture could enter.
"You are now at your new home," the driver said. "Mrs. Melissa Hellstrom is your owner. You're to do whatever she tells you to do. No fussing or arguments about where she tells you to place yourselves."
There was a chorus of yes responses from the furniture. Melissa nodded once in what appeared to be a happy, delighted manner as she received the set of smart furniture into her home.
"Okay, you there."
"Me?" a rocking chair asked.
"Yes, you, rocker. Follow me into the sitting room. You're to be my personal chair," Melissa ordered.
"All right!" the chair exclaimed as it made its way eagerly through the rest of the furniture. Without further comment, the rocker followed Melissa into another room where it took its place. It would wait there until called for or Melissa entered. Melissa left the rocker and returned to the living room.
"You and you are to be Dunston's personal chairs."
The chairs swiveled and glanced about as they tried to figure out which of them was being spoken to.
Melissa said, "Sorry about that. I'm talking to you, recliner, and you, sofa-bed. You're to see to my husband's wishes when he arrives home from work. You four kitchen chairs and table, follow me to the kitchen. Recliner and sofa-bed, move over so we can pass through."
Melissa was followed by four kitchen chairs and a matching table as she left the living room.
***
Dunston drove into the driveway. He felt tired and beat from another day at the office. As he left the car, he spotted the newspaper on the lawn and stopped to retrieve it. He couldn't help it. He liked things the way they were when he was growing up. He just didn't care to get his news over the Internet. For the feel of paper and an easy chair beneath him, he was willing to pay the extra amount it cost. Besides, he knew that when he was finished with the paper, there were all kinds of uses he could put the paper to in the home. You sure couldn't start a romantic fire in the fireplace with pixels. He opened the paper as he walked to the house. He hollered out, "I'm home, Melissa! It is I, your loving Dunston!" as he stared at the front page news.
"Out of my way! Out of my way!"
"No, you get out of the way! I'm supposed to see to his comfort."
"No, me!"
"She said me first! I'm first chair!"
Dunston opened the door and barely stepped inside before the door slammed back on him, catching him between it and the facing. Before he fell to the floor, first one piece of furniture, then the other, shoved against him trying to seat him first. By the time he hit the floor, his body had been crushed enough to kill him.
***
Melissa smiled weakly at her friends as they entered her home past the repaired door facing. The visiting women tried not to pay any attention to the repairs or the smart furniture around the kitchen table.
"You're certainly brave keeping some of that furniture in your home, Melissa," one woman finally said.
"No more than Donna after she lost her husband."
"Did you get any of your money refunded?" Donna asked.
"Of course, I did. They were only too glad to let me keep the rest of the furniture and refund the entire amount after taking back what was left of the recliner and sofa-bed. What with that, cancelling that expensive newspaper, the life insurance I received, and the generous settlement I received from the smart furniture insurers, I'm doing okay. Now I can actually have all the modern conveniences I always wanted. You just don't know how glad I am that you told me how Harvey died," Melissa answered cheerily.
}|{ the end }|{
First Chair
--- Interesting premise DAVE and a lot scary to think of "smart" furniture.... Makes one wonder about all of these new technical innovations the world will be seeing in the near future - Funny too how the chairs fought to be Dunston's "comfort" LOL --- Makes me wonder what type of footstool I shall have 
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