Lilly’s Greatest Fear by Vera Baklanova

When she was just a kid,
Lilly was the bravest little girl you’d ever meet. Dentist appointments weren’t a problem for her, and neither were shots. She wasn’t afraid of big dogs or her auntie’s angry fat cat. Dead mice or shiny green beetles couldn’t keep the young explorer in her away. There was, however, one specific fear that took Lilly several years to get over.
It all started when her mother brought home a new industrial grade vacuum cleaner. Lilly’s family dog, good old Madge, was absolutely terrified of the Hoover. She would start whimpering the minute it was rolled out of the closet, and barked ferociously, whenever this un-dog-ly device came near her hiding place.
Young Lilly, convinced that the dog was onto something, had now also declared that the Hover would be her undoing. There was no rationalizing her fear, she was inconsolable. She would spend the cleaning days under her bed, sobbing and trembling; her heart leaping out of her chest when Mum rolled the vacuum cleaner into her room.
For years and years, Lilly would still find every possible way out of vacuuming her room. And when she absolutely had to, it took all the courage she could gather, and her heart would still skip a beat with that first familiar roar.
*** Lilly’s knitting is scattered all around her house. The finished works cover up every surface imaginable and the rest of the yarn is unfurled and rolled around by her cats. Her house is warm and cosy like a craft store, and the cats adore it. What they do not enjoy, however, is the amount of vacuuming it takes.
Lilly loves her old Hoover and the noise no longer bothers her. She takes out her hearing aid and waltzes around the house, losing track of time with a wandering smile on her face. When her cats scatter around with hissing disapproval, she is reminded about the blissful days and adventures she used to have at her parents' house. And then, about the first months of living with her husband and trying to figure life out. And
then, about taking long walks with the baby, who took after her in being absolutely terrified of the vacuum cleaner. And about cleaning the kid’s room after sending him to college... The Hoover stuck with her through thick and thin, her childhood’s nemesis who watched her grow old.