LittleFluffyCloud

The Battle At Union Street Unit A

I get the chills now, just thinking about how sweet and innocent I was when I woke up this morning – how untouched by the filthiness of the world – how naïve, how charmingly ignorant. Not knowing what terror lie ahead.

So I wake up this morning, not ready to face Monday, mentally skimming through my sick excuses for a plausible reason to miss work.
I roll out of bed, eyes still crusty and closed. There’s not much furniture between the bed and the shower, so I usually make it there with little injury.

I reach into the shower, a place I may never venture again, and switch both showerheads onto the hottest setting possible at full blast. I like a little steam to be built up before I get in… opens the pores.
I undress in the closet, as Chevy watches. Is she clueless or gay? We’ll never know.

I reach back in the shower, and adjust the temperature of the showerheads to a more tolerable level, and wait for them align. I step in, and immediately feel better.
What is it about a shower that makes one feel alive and refreshed? I pick up the shampoo bottle, only seconds away from the horror that would consume me for years to come.
I massage the shampoo into my scalp, and lean my head back, eyes closed, taking in the moment as if I were filming a soap commercial.

Then, as I slowly opened my eyes and rinsed the last of the shampoo out of my hair, I saw It.

The mother, the mac daddy of all mac daddies, the I’ve-lived-in-Texas-all-my-life-and-never-seen-one-this-big, the steroidal, the what-the-hell-does-that-thing-eat Cockroach.
Clinging to my shower curtain the way I cling to any champagne glass. About 7 inches from my face. Near me. Next to me. Clearly just in there to wait for my pores to open up big enough to squeeze into one of them so it can take over my body and lay eggs and do other gross things.

Instincts take over and remind me that it’s a girl’s duty to scream and whimper and run to the nearest male upon seeing a bug. I do just that, as well as putting as much room between my body and the atrocity as humanly possible.

I tear out of the shower, soapy and soaking, into the bedroom and wept like someone who had their credit card declined at a Jimmy Choo sale. Words tumble out of my mouth, screeching and garbled, and the decibels at which my voice was operating at immediately put Jersey on full alert.
Bryan took a little more time waking up, not quite aware of the gargantuan creature that had taken up home in our shower. Bleary-eyed and still the innocent soul I once was, I attempted to explain what had attacked me, where it was, and what needed to happen to it, through screams, tears and wild hand gestures.

He slowly shuffles to the bathroom, most likely having already reached the conclusion that his wife is a nutcase, and this is just another example of her crying wolf. Part of me wanted to pull him back, to save him from the nightmares that I would inevitably have as a result of this experience – the other part of me wanted him to see what I had seen, to experience the horror for himself, just to prove that I was indeed sane.

It turns out that I had endured only a fraction of what my dear husband would encounter.

He goes in armed with a size 12 Kenneth Cole dress shoe (and if you even have to ask which of us wears that size, then you’re dumb), clearly as terrified as I was, but since he’s a boy, he has to retain an air of confidence.

I keep my distance, far away enough so that I have a head start if it charges at me, but close enough so I can witness what will hopefully be a very tormented and gruesome death.

Minutes go by as Bryan uses his forefinger and thumb to carefully lift the shower curtain, poking with the shoe, and presumably hoping he doesn’t have to meet this thing in person. But that won’t suffice. I nag at him that unless he hunts this alien down and kills it and I get to watch it die, that I will make his life a living hell.

Jersey and I grow tired of the spectacle, and as we’re both turning around to go listen to more “Breaking News from Israel”, we hear a noise, which resembles a scream, but sounds not of this world.

It had come from Bryan.

Apparently the Creature from Hell had leaped off of the shower curtain and onto his leg, with blatant intentions to live in our home and terrorize us. It’s spins Bryan into a tailspin, as he moves his body in a way I have never seen him do, with the sole purpose of getting the Thing off his leg, at whatever cost.

It flies (YES I SAID FLIES) into the closet, and Bryan dives in after it, drunk from anger and masculinity, and knows that only one of them will emerge from the closet a victor, and he is intent on not going down without a fight.

I am prideful as any wife is whose husband goes into battle with determination, but secretly terrified for his life. But I cannot let on that I am weak inside – I cheer him on from the safety of the bedroom, as Jersey watches her father fight the fight of his life.

I peer in only once, knowing that I am putting myself at risk, but I must see for myself.
Clothes are being tossed around like the closet is a huge clothes dryer, and all I see is a blur of colors and textures. I get too close and am almost taken down by a hanger, and I retreat quickly. But it’s what I hear that gives me the shivers. Smacks, bangs, buzzings and a variety of other battle-related sounds are being emitted from the warzone, as well as the occasional curse word.

Every curse word is music to my ears, as it tells me that Bryan is still going strong, and the Monster has not yet declared victory.

After what seems like hours, a calm silence smothers the 3^rd floor. The silence is deafening. It lasts too long, but I can’t break it. I can’t find my voice, because I’m afraid if I yell out his name, I won’t get a response.

But then I hear the sound that tells me Peters has won… the flush of a toilet.

Jersey and I let out our breath, and Bryan emerges from the bathroom, bloody, clothes torn, and more exhausted than I had ever seen. But what matters was that he won, and our home was ours again. My hero.

posted on Monday, July 24, 2006