they came from the chimney

At first there were just one or two dropping down through the chimney buzzing around inside the fireplace then out into the family room where I waited shoe-in-hand to swat em, smush em, then throw them outside. That was before implementation of the brilliant idea to light the gas fireplace. It was then they came. Like a horror movie they fell down into the fireplace and out into the family room five then ten at a time. Moments later I had the fireplace door shut and the freed wasps squashed. I chased the kids downstairs and watched as the wasps started crawling between the crevices of the door. Every three or four seconds one came free and I got it. But then out of the corner of my eye I caught movement on the bricks beside the fireplace. Six or seven were crawling out onto the bricks from the gap between the frame and bricks. The existence of that gap had completely escaped my notice the three and a half years I’ve lived here but had cemented itself into my mind as an immovable fact in that one moment. Frantically I killed the ten more that had escaped, grabbed the packing tape and started sealing that fireplace. Half an hour later the mini-crisis was over and all that was left was to hunt down and kill the ones I’d missed. Four or five more were found buzzing around the family room between then and lunch time today. I can see at least 50 dead wasps at the bottom of the fireplace now. The local pest control service assures me that they’ll all be dead in a couple of days once the freeze hits and that I should just wait the rest out. Maybe that’s true but I’ll have my shop vac at the ready just in case when I finally do unseal the fireplace after the freeze … just in case.