I'm exhausted. The in-laws are here for the weekend and there has been the usual round of baseball games and kids' activities, and then there was our impromptu celebration over seeing my COLUMN (Notice how gracefully and subtly I have managed to work this in) in the Fort Worth Star Telegram, a major metropolitan paper
serving the Dallas-Ft.Worth Metroplex, read by millions of people, on the front page of the Weekly Review, the SUNDAY edition, rubbing print elbows with MOLLY IVINS, a world famous political columnist, and JAY ROOT, the Chief of their Austin bureau. And MY name was in the same size print as theirs. My little column on the Texas Homecoming Corsage! It's impressive how they were able to perceive the deeply penetrating political implications and wisdom behind my words. Not everyone can do that.
Anyway, that's really not why I'm so tired. But it did give me a chance to share my news in an off-handedly accidental and casually blas‚ fashion.
The real reason I'm tired is because I was awakened by small noises in the middle of the night and they were coming from under the bed. I quickly checked to see if I had all my limbs under the covers for as any Stephen King afficionado knows, one never
extends a hand or foot over the edge of the bed at night. Then I reached for the only weapon at hand: my trusty Itty Bitty Book Light. I slid to the edge of the bed and hung over, staring at the Battenburg lace bedskirt. What horror lurked behind its pristine-well, maybe slightly dusty-facade? Lifting it
slowly, I shone the light at-Blue and a large horrible mass of something. I screamed, dropped the booklight, leaped out of bed and ran for a corner. I don't know why I did this-don't ask. I suppose it was the fight-or-flight response to my life-threatening situation.
"Dan!" I hissed at him who sleeps through anything. He stirred.
"What are you doing over there?" he muttered.
"Blue brought in something big and mutilated," I moaned, pointing at the bed. He sat up and looked around with some trepidation. After all, I'm on the other side of the room and he's in the bed with who knows what?
"Where is it?"
"Under the bed and it's really big and gross." My toes curled at the memory.
He settled back, relieved. I guess he'd had a momentary vision of that horse's head scene in The Godfather. "Is it dead?"
"I think so."
"Then it won't bother you. It'll be there in the morning." He lay back down, apparently thinking I was going to spend the night in the corner.
"You have to get it. Blue's there with it and I think he might be eating it."
Dan sighed and heaved himself out of bed. He looked under the bed and said disgustedly, "Blue, give it up." I ran to the bathroom for paper towels and garbage bags. He said, "Can you get Blue? He's guarding it."
I would absolutely not look again at whatever it was, and went to the other side of the bed, where I managed to get hold of Blue's tail and pull him out, claws ripping a swath through the carpet. He looked at me and purred loudly; this was his idea of a really great night. His little gift had obviously been a success. Dan meanwhile, had scooped up the thing and disposed of it.
"What is it," I asked, not sure I wanted to know.
"I don't know," he said.
"Well, is it dead?"
"I don't know."
Was it a squirrel?"
"I don't know. Could we go back to bed, please."
I leaped into the bed from five feet away on his side and crawled over him. After all, it might have multiplied before being discovered. Blue may have brought several in before discovery. Who knows what else is under there? Dan grunted as I landed a knee in his stomach.
"I don't think I can sleep," I whined.
He sighed in disgust and rolled over, back to me, beginning to snore immediately. I lay in the dark and thought bitterly that Stephen King would have understood. |
