40 Degrees - Tealy and the Crew

It had started subtly.

Tealy had been on the couch at 9 PM, new blankets courtesy of Beric's place, the thermostat set to a reasonable 72 degrees, everything normal, everything fine, the week's events receding into the background where they belonged.

He had glanced at the thermostat at 9:14 PM.

He looked at it.

He had set it to 72. He had definitely set it to 72. He had set it to 72 with the specific intentionality of someone who had recently slept under bathroom towels and was not going to let that happen again and had therefore ensured the temperature situation was handled.

He got up. Set it back to 72. Sat down.

Looked at it at 9:15 PM.

---

He set it back to 72.

Watched it.

It held for a while. He watched it the way you watch something you don't trust, with the peripheral attention of a person who is doing something else but is also monitoring. He made it to 9:21 PM before he checked again.

It had skipped one.

Or he had missed 71 while watching his phone.

He set it to 72.

Sat back down.

Checked at 9:22 PM.

"Okay," said Tealy, to his thermostat.

He got up. Set it to 72. Stood in front of it. Watched it.

It held at 72 for a full minute.

He stood there for another minute.

He went back to the couch.

9:24 PM. He checked.

He set it to 72 four more times over the next ten minutes with the escalating energy of someone who was not yet angry but was building toward it in a structured way. The thermostat returned to 71 every time, on a schedule that was now clearly one degree per minute, regular and committed, as though something had decided 72 was a ceiling and was enforcing this.

By 9:35 PM it was at 68 and he had stopped fighting it.

Not because he had accepted it. Because he had done the math and the math said if it was dropping one degree per minute and he had been correcting it for twenty minutes and it was currently at 68 then the correcting was not working and he was going to need a different approach or just sleep and deal with it.

He chose sleep, which in retrospect, looking at the math, was not the different approach that the situation called for.

---

At midnight he woke up briefly and checked the thermostat from bed.

58 degrees.

He pulled the blanket tighter.

It was a good blanket. Beric's place had delivered. He was adequately warm under it.

He went back to sleep.

At 1 AM he woke up again.

52 degrees.

He added the second blanket.

Still fine. Still manageable. He had two excellent blankets now and a resting body temperature and a house that was apparently determined to become a refrigerator but had not yet achieved that goal.

He went back to sleep.

At 2 AM something woke him.

He lay there and identified the thing that had woken him.

It was the cold.

Not a noise. Not a dream. Not a number or an object or his brain deciding to scream about something. Just the cold, which had reached the specific temperature at which two good blankets were no longer a complete solution and his body had registered this as urgent information.

He looked at the thermostat.

47 degrees.

He got up, walked to the thermostat, and set it to 72.

Watched it drop to 71 in real time.

Set it to 72.

He stood in his 47 degree house at 2 AM in his pajamas and looked at the thermostat and the thermostat looked back and they had a moment of mutual acknowledgment that this was where they were.

He set it to 72.

He went back to bed.

---

At 3 AM he woke up and it was 40 degrees.

Not 41. Not 40-something. 40 degrees Fahrenheit, the temperature at which Orlando, Florida houses were not supposed to find themselves, the temperature at which the two excellent blankets from Beric's place were doing their best work and their best work was not enough, the temperature that had been achieved through three hours of sustained one-degree-per-minute decline that had not been stopped by any of Tealy's interventions because something about the thermostat had decided this was happening regardless.

He could see his breath.

Inside his house.

In Florida.

He lay there for a moment and looked at the ceiling and breathed out and watched the breath and thought about a lot of things and settled on texting DumbDird because he needed to tell someone and DumbDird was awake, DumbDird was always awake, DumbDird was outside with a pipe probably.

"It's 40 degrees in my house"

The response came in four seconds.

"DURR TALLY LIKE OUTSIDE"

"Inside."

"DURR TALLY IT'S FLORIDA"

"I know."

"DURR HOW"

"The thermostat kept going down one degree every minute. I kept fixing it. It kept going back down. I gave up and went to sleep. It's 40 degrees."

A pause.

"DURR TALLY"

"Yeah."

"DURR DID YOU GIVE UP AND GO TO SLEEP WHILE IT WAS STILL GOING DOWN"

Tealy looked at this message.

"Yes."

"DURR TALLY"

"I know."

"DURR TALLY THAT'S VERY TALLY OF YOU"

Tealy looked at the ceiling.

His breath was still visible.

"It's 40 degrees, DumbDird."

"DURR YEAH TALLY I'M COMING"

"Don't bring the pipe—"

"DURR I'M NOT BRINGING THE PIPE TALLY IT'S NOT A PIPE SITUATION"

"What are you bringing."

"DURR TALLY I HAVE A SPACE HEATER"

"Why do you have a space heater."

"DURR TALLY I JUST HAVE IT"

---

DumbDird arrived in eleven minutes, which raised its own questions about where he had been, wearing three layers including the sequined game show jacket on top, carrying a space heater with both hands, and with the expression of a man who had assessed the situation and arrived prepared.

Tealy opened the door.

The cold hit DumbDird in the face.

"DURR," said DumbDird.

"Yeah," said Tealy.

"DURR TALLY IT'S REALLY COLD—"

"I know."

"DURR IT'S FLORIDA—"

"I KNOW, DUMBD—"

DumbDird came inside. Plugged in the space heater. Set it to high. Looked at the thermostat, which was currently at 39 degrees because it had dropped another degree since Tealy's text, and reached out and set it to 72.

They both watched it.

"Durr," said DumbDird.

"Yeah," said Tealy.

"DURR TALLY YOUR THERMOSTAT—"

"I know."

"DURR IT JUST KEEPS—"

"I know, DumbDird."

They stood in front of the thermostat together at 3:15 AM in 39 degree Florida and watched it count down with the steady commitment of something that had an agenda and was keeping to it.

"Durr," said DumbDird quietly.

"Yeah."

"Durr, Tally. Why."

"I don't know."

"Durr, is it haunted."

Tealy looked at the thermostat.

It hit 68.

"I don't know," he said again.

"DURR TALLY WHAT IF IT'S HAUNTED—"

"Thermostats aren't haunted—"

"DURR TALLY THIS ONE MIGHT BE—"

"It's a thermostat—"

"DURR TALLY A LOT OF WEIRD THINGS HAPPEN AT YOUR HOUSE—"

Tealy thought about the lamp. About DumbDird in the lamp, which had never been explained, which had simply happened and been accepted and moved on from because there was no framework for it and building a framework would take time nobody had.

"It's not haunted," Tealy said, with slightly less confidence than he intended.

---

He texted Beric at 3:20 AM because if anyone was going to have thoughts about a thermostat that descended one degree per minute regardless of intervention it was Beric.

"My thermostat keeps dropping one degree per minute. I can't stop it. It's been doing it since 9 PM. It's currently 38 degrees in my house."

Beric replied in two minutes, which meant Beric was either awake or had a notification setting for thermostat-related emergencies, both of which felt possible.

"Has anyone adjusted the schedule settings."

Tealy looked at this message.

"The what."

"Schedule settings. Most smart thermostats have a programmable schedule. If someone set a cooling schedule it would override manual adjustments."

"It's a smart thermostat."

"Yes."

"Someone set a schedule."

"Almost certainly."

"Who."

The chat was quiet for a moment.

Then DumbDird sent: "DURR"

Tealy turned and looked at DumbDird, who was standing next to the thermostat holding the space heater cord and wearing the specific expression of someone whose "DURR" had just done a lot of confessional work.

"DumbDird," Tealy said.

"DURR, TALLY—"

"Did you set a schedule on my thermostat."

"DURR, TALLY, I WAS TRYING TO HELP—"

"How is 40 degrees helping—"

"DURR, TALLY, I DIDN'T MEAN FOR IT TO GO THAT FAR, I JUST SET IT TO GO DOWN A LITTLE AT NIGHT—"

"One degree per minute—"

"DURR, I THOUGHT IT WOULD STOP, TALLY—"

"WHERE DID YOU THINK IT WOULD STOP—"

"DURR, I DON'T KNOW, TALLY, DURR, LIKE 65—"

"IT'S 38 DEGREES—"

"DURR, TALLY, COOL TEMPERATURES ARE GOOD FOR SLEEPING, I READ IT—"

"38 IS NOT A COOL TEMPERATURE, DUMBD—"

"DURR, I KNOW THAT NOW—"

Tealy stood in his 38 degree house at 3:22 AM and looked at DumbDird, who was in three layers and the sequined jacket and was holding a space heater that he had brought because he had known it would be cold because he had set the thermostat to go cold because he had read something about sleep temperatures and had applied this information with the precision and judgment of someone who had also once put watermelon gum in a SayoDevice.

"You brought the space heater," Tealy said.

"DURR, YEAH—"

"Because you knew it would be cold."

"DURR, YEAH—"

"Because you set the thermostat."

"DURR, TALLY, I WAS GOING TO COME FIX IT—"

"At 3 AM."

"DURR, I WAS MONITORING IT, TALLY—"

"You were outside."

"DURR, JUST IN CASE—"

Tealy put his face in his hands.

Not in despair specifically. In the specific exhaustion of someone who had been cold for six hours because their best friend had read something about sleep temperatures, had applied this information to someone else's thermostat, had anticipated the outcome sufficiently to prepare a space heater, and had then monitored the situation from outside like a very cold, very well-meaning security guard.

"Beric," Tealy typed, "can you remove the schedule remotely."

"Yes. One moment."

The thermostat, which had hit 37, stopped.

Started climbing.

DumbDird watched it go up with the expression of a man watching something he had caused be corrected by someone more technically competent than himself, which was an expression he wore occasionally and which always had the same quality of genuine relief mixed with mild sheepishness.

"DURR," he said softly.

"Yeah," said Tealy.

They watched it climb.

The space heater was working too. The room was becoming a place a human could be in again. Tealy's breath stopped being visible somewhere around 55 degrees, which he marked internally as a milestone.

"Durr, Tally," DumbDird said at 65 degrees.

"What."

"Durr, I'm sorry about the thermostat."

"I know."

"Durr, the article said cool temperatures improve sleep quality—"

"Not 38 degrees—"

"DURR, I KNOW THAT NOW TALLY—"

"38 degrees is where things freeze, DumbDird—"

"DURR, I KNOW—"

"Water freezes at 32, you were aiming for somewhere in that zone—"

"DURR, TALLY, I WASN'T AIMING FOR THAT, I THOUGHT IT WOULD STOP—"

"At what—"

"DURR—" A pause. "Durr, I don't know Tally. I thought the thermostat would know."

Tealy looked at him.

The thermostat hit 72.

Held there.

"You thought the thermostat would know when to stop," Tealy said.

"Durr, yeah."

"The thermostat you had programmed to go down one degree per minute indefinitely."

"Durr, yeah, Tally, I thought it had like, durr, a sense of when it was too far."

"It's a thermostat."

"Durr, yeah, I know that now."

Tealy looked at the thermostat.

The thermostat held at 72 with the reliability of a device that had had its schedule removed by Beric and was now just doing what it was told, which was all it had ever been doing, which was the whole problem.

He looked at DumbDird, who was still in three layers and the sequined jacket, holding a space heater, having monitored his house from outside for six hours in case it got too cold, which it had, because DumbDird had made it cold.

"Thank you Beric," he typed.

"The schedule has been removed. I'd also recommend changing the thermostat password."

"DURR WHAT'S A THERMOSTAT PASSWORD" DumbDird sent.

Tealy changed the thermostat password.

Did not share it.

DumbDird looked at the thermostat. Looked at Tealy. Looked at the thermostat.

"Durr," he said.

"No," said Tealy.

"DURR, TALLY—"

"No."

"DURR, WHAT IF YOU GET COLD—"

"Then I will adjust my own thermostat."

"DURR, BUT—"

"DumbDird."

"DURR, YEAH."

"You made my house 38 degrees."

"Durr, yeah."

"In Florida."

"Durr, yeah, Tally."

"Go home."

DumbDird picked up the space heater.

Looked at Tealy.

"Durr, can I leave the space heater."

Tealy looked at it.

"Yes," he said.

"DURR, OKAY—"

"Go home, DumbDird."

"DURR, GOING, DURR—" He was at the door. "DURR, TALLY?"

"What."

"Durr, the article really did say cool temperatures are good for sleep."

"Goodnight DumbDird."

"DURR, GOODNIGHT TALLY—"

"It said like 65—"

"GOODNIGHT—"

"DURR, I KNOW THAT NOW—"

The door closed.

Tealy stood in his 72 degree house and looked at the thermostat and the space heater and the two good blankets on the couch and thought about the week.

The towels. The hangers. The number. The sugar pills. The raisin bran. The expired milk. The blankets and Tuesday. Blara and the ripped towel. The thumbs up balloon. The 40 degrees.

He picked up the space heater.

Carried it to the bedroom.

Got in bed.

Set it next to him on the low setting.

Not because he needed it. The house was 72 degrees. He did not need a space heater at 72 degrees.

He just wanted it there.

He went to sleep.

Did not scream.

Did not think about towels.

The thermostat held at 72 all night.

He slept until 10 AM.

It was, accounting for everything, a pretty good night.