I’m The Only Plumber In Arendelle And My Life Is A Shit Show
The unpredictable freeze-thaw cycle is destroying the sewage system and spreading dysentery throughout the kingdom.
Queen Elsa, thank you for agreeing to meet with me. Your highness, I hesitate to complain, but I must speak out. This unpredictable freeze-thaw cycle is destroying Arendelle’s sewage system.
You know I have the utmost respect for the crown and the Arendellian system that puts teenagers with magical powers in charge of the kingdom’s health, defense, and infrastructure. I’ve a duty to the queen even if she never thinks of the effect her magic tricks have on the infrastructure of her city.
I’ve only just come from another castle crisis — a burst sewage line filled the dungeons with a flood of excrement. These medieval (Is that when we are?) pipes cannot take the change from a balmy summer day to a frigid ice rink just because Princess Anna fancies a skate. What do you think is under that ice rink? A metric ton of sewage encased in terracotta, and clay pipes aren’t made to stand up to this kind of abuse. Unless Olaf wants to act out his summer beach fantasy in an ocean of fecal matter, I beg you to think before you freeze.
I’m grateful for the work — I am. The year you turned on eternal winter, I made enough to put my nine children through school. But it’s too much for one man. I’m up to my knees in it. Honestly, I think my wife is about to leave me. I work twenty hours per day, and I can’t get the stench of feculence out of my pores. Even Wandering Oaken won’t let me in the sauna anymore.
Perhaps, my liege, you could set up some sort of royal plumbing school and recruit from among the kingdom’s ice salesmen — do we really need so many? I know it’s less fun to sing while mucking out a leaking, half-frozen pool of human/reindeer ordure than while collecting ice under the aurora borealis, but all the same, my queen, it’s necessary. Maybe you could offer some kind of retraining bonus?
That dysentery outbreak we had last month? Awful, especially with Princess Anna and Kristoff getting sick during their first romantic weekend away. With a relationship as new as theirs, we’re lucky they made it through intact.
And Olaf leaving messes all over the castle — it’s just water, but the poor guy was suffering.
If we don’t watch out, we’ll have more than dysentery on our hands. I’m talking worms, your highness. You’re gonna need more than silk gloves to avoid those. I guess you could teach them a little song or something, though I don’t know how that would help.
It’s not all your fault, my queen. We can’t overlook Sven’s damage. Know how much that frigging reindeer weighs? Four hundred pounds. When he’s dancing like a ballerina over those old pipes, every step is another crack that leads us closer to filling the fjord with poo. You get a couple of hot summer days and, whew, you’ll be packing your bags for Weselton.
I wasn’t going to admit it, your highness, but my wife and I have actually been talking about emigrating to Weselton where they at least have normal seasons. It may be our last shot at keeping our marriage together.
Listen Queen Elsa, I’m begging you, as a loyal subject, unless you want to go back to the days of doing your business in the woods like a troll, you’re gonna have to shore up our sewage infrastructure. It may not be as sexy as building a new ice palace, but it’s important. And please, the next time you want to freeze the fountain because it looks cute, or whip up an ice sculpture garden or a two-story vodka luge, perhaps you’ll think of me, the only plumber in Arendelle.
Hallie Pritts writes both funny and not-funny things. Her work can be found in McSweeney’s, The Missouri Review, The Belladonna, and others. She’s working on a thriller.