Do Not Remove This Tag

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Nate stared at the purple tag. DO NOT REMOVE THIS TAG. There was no other information on it, so what was the point of it? It was on the second-hand mattress he had bought cheap, all that he could afford, and the mattress was not very comfortable. In fact it was lumpy, and the lumps tended to poke him almost as if self-animated. He was getting ready for bed, dreading another bad night’s sleep, with the night yet young, and in no mood for arrogant tags. It was bad enough existing on unemployment and limited savings; he didn’t need this.

What the hell. At least he could deal with this annoyance. What could they do, throw him in jail? He took hold of the tag and pulled.

It resisted his effort. “So it’s like that, is it?” he muttered. “Well, we’ll see, you self-important little piece of fluff.”

He went to fetch a pair of pliers. He fastened them on the tag and yanked hard. It ripped out of the mattress seam with a pained noise of separation. It truly had not wanted to be removed. But it had tangled with the wrong person.

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