Hot Flash Series Vol. I | Issue I Millie and the Internal Volcano

Manic Menopause Millie was trying to enjoy a perfectly normal evening in her perfectly normal armchair. The book was thrilling ("101 Uses for a Shiny Bottlecap"), the lighting was dim, and the snacks were within reach. All was calm. Until it wasn't. A strange warmth began to bloom in her chest, a creeping heat that had absolutely nothing to do with the radiator.

"Oh, fantastic," she muttered, her whiskers twitching. "My personal, portable furnace is firing up again." The warmth bloomed into a full-blown, five-alarm heatwave. Her cozy burrow suddenly felt like a sauna designed by a sadist. She furiously fanned her face with her book, but it was like trying to put out a forest fire with a damp napkin.

With a groan, she abandoned her reading and made a mad dash for the kitchen. She flung open the refrigerator door and plunged her head inside, nestling her cheek against a bag of slightly wilted lettuce. The cold air was a temporary paradise, a blessed relief from the inferno raging within.

"Millie, darling? Is everything alright?" a voice called out. It was her partner, Bartholomew, a raccoon who was perpetually cold. "I was just thinking of putting on a kettle and maybe lighting a fire. It's dreadfully drafty in here."

Millie extracted her head from the fridge, her fur lightly frosted. "A fire?" she asked, her voice dripping with sarcasm. "Bartholomew, my sweet, my internal core temperature is currently capable of forging steel. If you so much as look at a matchstick, I will not be responsible for the consequences."

Just as Bartholomew wisely decided to become one with the sofa cushions, the heatwave broke. A sudden, clammy chill washed over Millie, and she began to shiver violently in her now-damp hoodie. "Ah," she said to a jar of pickles. "And now for the arctic tundra portion of the evening. What fun."

She stomped past the living room. "I'm going outside," she announced to a sleeping Bartholomew, who was definitely not sleeping. "I need to feel the cold sting of reality on my face and ponder the joys of my body's chaotic betrayal."

The night air was blissfully cold. For about a minute. Then, the next internal volcano began its eruption. It was a big one. In a moment of sheer desperation, Millie spotted her neighbor's birdbath, gleaming in the moonlight. Without a second thought, she dunked her entire head into the icy water.

"Ahem!" a sharp voice cut through the night. It was Beatrice, the badger from next door, peering out her window. "Millie, is that you? Having a bit of a late-night swim, are we?" Millie slowly lifted her dripping face from the birdbath.

"It's a new Korean skin care routine, Beatrice," Millie called back sweetly. "Cold-plunge therapy. All the rage." She shook her head, sending a spray of water into the petunias. The familiar chill was already returning. This was her life now, a rollercoaster of fire and ice. And it was going to be a very, very interesting ride.