Word of the Day: importune

The final story, at long last. I am more grateful than usual for Friday’s appearance. A small shout out to my little sister for brainstorming help with these last few stories.

The final nominee for Best Picture is An Education. It has Olivia Williams in it. (She was Adelle on Dollhouse.) Clearly, this year, for me, it’s all about the Whedon alums. Except for the part where I failed to mention yesterday that Simon Helberg (Moist) played a rabbi in A Serious Man. So, I did that just now.

Did I mention I’m glad it’s Friday?

Today’s Word:

importune

As in:

The nursing home was clean, well-staffed, and pleasant enough. If it was a bit out-dated, that was not such a huge thing, after all, the most important thing was that it was cheap. Well, cheaper. He couldn’t take his mother to the *cheapest* place, that would be unseemly.

Once David Goldman got his mother settled, he’d come ’round once or twice a week, say “hello,” bring her some sweets. It’ll be much better for her. He’d sell her flat, just one more profitable business venture. She would importune him to keep it, but, it was worth much more than what he’d offered her, and he was a businessman after all.

He knew he shouldn’t take such advantage of his own mother, and a twinge of guilt tugged at his conscience. He ignored it, and moved onto other thoughts.

After a few days, he had been called to the nursing home because of some disturbance. His mother and her roommate had been involved in some sort of altercation.

As he came close to his mother’s room, the other woman came into focus, and he knew.

Marvina Coopersmith had lived a flat not far from here, and he had “encouraged” her to sell her flat, at a substantially reduced price, when a black family had moved into her building. That he had encouraged the Faucets to move there was just part of the bargain. “Blockbusting” worked just as well in England as it did in the U.S.

Of course, while he “worked” with the elderly widow to purchase her flat, he’d also visited a number of times, and “acquired” a few items from Marvina’s jewelry collection, which might’ve found their way into his mother’s hands.

He ducked out of sight of the door, in case she recognized him. He’d never thought he’d see her again, and in the worst way imaginable. What if they put the connection together? How was he going to explain this mess?

Quickly, he exited the building. When he reached his office, he made arrangements, over the phone, to have his mother moved to another, slightly more expensive, nursing home. He contacted the home, made up a story about having acquired the jewelry from an unidentifiable man in a pub years ago, and he hoped that that would be the end of it.  The spot of guilt was much harder to ignore that afternoon, and it lingered with him for many days, and decided never again to give his mother stolen jewelry.

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Yay for Friday! Farewell to the guilty Oscars!  Type to you all on Monday.

importune / IM – per – TUNE / to urge or beg with annoying persistence