Write a short piece of fiction that could be included in a magazine to fill the space at the end of a long article. It should be about a home improvement project that didn't go as expected. It should be under 300 words and light and positive in tone.
We have been living in our house for about a month. I liked the new house and was happy that we had been able to find it. Rentals were hard to come by. One thing that bugged me though was the intercom unit on the second-floor landing. I kept telling my spouse that I was going to take it down. She kept laughing and saying emphatically, "Don't bother it!" one Saturday morning, I decided it was time to act. I gathered some screwdrivers, pliers, and wire cutters to attack the project. I carefully took all of the screws out of the plate holding it on the wall. I pulled it away from the wall and found red and white wires attached to the back of it. I wasn't sure what to do. I picked up the wire cutters and decided to snip the wires. As I cut through them, there was a loud popping noise, the lights in our house blinked twice, and then everything went dark. I heard my wife yell, "What are you doing up there?" I looked down at the wire cutters in my hand and was thankful that they had rubber handles or that might've been my very last home improvement project. I decided that from then on, I would take my wife's advice.