I was woken from a deep sleep at seven a.m. Saturday morning by the sound of something pounding loudly near my head.  Yawning, I tried to prod my brain into waking up faster so I could get to the bottom of the mystery, but it stubbornly refused and I was forced to wait a few moments until I was able to hold onto a coherent line of thought.  ‘I’m going to stab you with a Q-tip one of these days,’ I threatened my brain.  My brain must not have taken the threat seriously because it ignored me in favor of trying to identify what was on the rampage downstairs.  It was much too loud to be the dogs and the sounds of chaos and destruction didn’t stay in one place when they were wreaking havoc, and it was more like a sledge—I groaned and jerked the covers up over my head. 

“What is wrong with him?” I moaned into the sheet over my face.  “It’s—” I pushed the covers back and looked at my clock “—seven o’clock in the morning.  On a Saturday!”  I pulled the covers back over me.  When Dad told Mom and me he planned to get an early start on knocking down the partial wall that separated the dining room from the living room, I thought he meant he’d start around ten or eleven because sane people were still asleep at seven a.m.—at least, they were unless someone was making a lot of noise right below them and it was impossible to sleep.  He should have said he was going to start just after dawn or something and then I would have known to sleep on the rec room couch so his banging didn’t wake me up.  There was a TV down there, too, that was hooked up to Dish Network’s TurboHD (which was total win and pwned the regular cable my BFF Chastity had) so I didn’t have to try and watch High School Musical with Dad making lots of noise so I’d hardly be able to hear it and telling lots of lame jokes about Zac Efron and Corbin Bleu and teasing me about having crushes on them (I so totally didn’t.  Can’t a girl say a guy is hot without everyone thinking she’s crushing on him?).  The only thing the rec room needed to be totally perfect was a lock on the door to keep the ‘rents out. 

On the first floor, the sound of Dad busting up the wall was almost deafening.  He was wearing a pair of those really geeky safety goggles Mr. Dillard always made us wear in Chem lab and there was a lot of dust from the wall all over them so I was pretty sure he wouldn’t be able to hear or see me going past to the basement door, but somehow he did. 

“Tara.”  I stopped and pivoted smoothly when he said my name.  “Why do you have your pillow and a sheet?  Where are you going, a sleepover?  I think you’re a little late, honey.”  He started to chuckle but got serious pretty quick when he saw I wasn’t laughing with him.  I tried not to roll my eyes and tell him to just get to the point so I could go back to sleep. 

“It’s okay to laugh, honey.  I promise not to think that means you think I’m not totally uncool and lame.”  Uncomfortable silence.  “So where are you going?  What’s wrong with your room?” 

“It’s right over you banging and making way too much noise to sleep?” I said distainfully.  “I’m going to the rec room to sleep, and watch TV later there so I don’t have to deal with all your noise and lame jokes.”  With a small ‘hmph’, I pivoted back and started toward the basement door. 

“You won’t be able to watch the TV,” Dad said.  “I had to turn off the power to the dining room so I didn’t get fried removing outlets from this wall.  I’ll be done in a day or two, so I’m just leaving the power off.  That way, I don’t need to try to remember if the power is off or not when I’m getting rid of that wiring later.” 

“No TV?” I cried, stopping mid-step.  “Where am I supposed to watch movies and my shows and stuff, then?  You’re making too much noise to watch TV up here.”  This was beyond unfair and mean.  “Can’t I turn on the power for a few hours this afternoon so I can watch TV?” 

“No.  It’s off and I want it to stay that way.  There are plenty of other things you can do besides watch Zeke and Cory flex their muscles and smile real pretty like the girly boys they are.” 

“It’s Zac and Corbin and they are not girly boys and I do not always watch stuff with them in it.  Dad, please!  You’re not dealing with the plugs right now so why can’t I watch TV?  Just tell me when you’re going to work on them and I’ll shut the power off.” 

“I said ‘no’, and if you don’t drop it right now you can forget about watching any TV for a whole week.  Comprende?” 

“Yeah,” I said reluctantly, rolling my eyes.  This weekend was so totally going to drag by and be totally boring.  Maybe I’d see if some of my friends wanted to go see a movie or something later.