I don’t know how long I was out for – an hour maybe two. I find myself in that lovely space; suspended in the ether between peaceful oblivion and consciousness. I long to sink back into my dreams but motherhood strongly insists that I become alert. Soon I’m aware of the tick, tick, ticking of the overhead fan and I wait for a more urgent noise; a cry from my kids.
When nothing but the steady thrum of the fan is heard, I relax and begin to drift. My dog isn’t as eager to sleep and lets loose a menacing growl. I sit up and study my familiar surroundings. My eyes dart from one corner to the next, drawn to the moving shadows cast by a cars passing headlights.
I can’t see anything out of the ordinary but the dog persists with her steady, ominous thunder.
“Daisy, knock it off,” I beg.
Goose flesh adorns my skin and I wish my husband wasn’t working the night shift. I reach for the bat beside my bed and pull it up onto my lap. I sit for some time listening to every knock, tap, and creek in the threatening darkness.
I turn towards the wall of closets and study the creepy silhouettes that reside within. Instinctively I know this is where the monster hides. My hands tighten around the cool aluminum as I slip quietly out of bed and into an encounter with the cleverly hidden intruder. I thrust my bat into a wall of clothes, knocking hangers and their contents to the floor. I shut each closet after I’m done until all four are firmly closed. Nothing hides inside them. I turn in slow circles; bat raised and ready to strike. My dog has finished her grumbling and watches me with curiosity.
“Don’t look at me like I’m crazy, dog, you started this”. She wags her tail at the sound of my voice, and for a moment I swear she’s smiling at her own clever joke.
When nothing arises out of the gloom to violently murder me I climb back into bed and settle into its comfortable embrace. I try to get back to sleep but my mind won’t rest. I toss and turn and fluff my pillow but I’m too nervous to sleep. I have this compulsive need to investigate the rest of the house. What if someone broke in with devious plans and wicked intent? A rapist or serial killer might be sneaking up the stairs, right now, to commit atrocious acts against my family. I reach for the bat and slip out of bed once more. I tiptoe towards the stairs. I descend into the gloom to fight the shadows and my imagination, while the dog lightly snores and the ceiling fan ticks down every second of lost sleep.
Written Ramblings 
OH living in the country I hear all kinds of things at night. My dogs do the same thing, usually encouraged and started by the dogs outside. Drives me crazy.
I used to live in the country too but my dogs were generally very quiet. Now that I’m in the city my little shitzu is a nutball and growls and barks at her own dang shadow! She’s a bit blind so who knows what she thought she was seeing that night lol.
I can never sleep when my husband is out of town! And I have done the same exact thing ha ha! You’re lucky you have a guard dog! 😉
She’d be good at warning me that someone was trying to kill me, but she definitely wouldn’t protect me. She hides behind me if a dog gets too close to her during our walks lol.
I just love the last line! Well done.
Thank you! It just came out and I was like…Oh hey that works! lol.
Being that I’m home alone for the next few nights, I’m going to have to put lots of energy into forgetting all about this story! 😉
You successfully creeped me out!
Sorry 🙂 Hope you manage to forget and you get some sleep!
I think I’d flip if my dog was acting out of sorts like that — she’s a lazy and friendly Lab and the only think that scares her is thunder. If it was quiet and she was freaking, I’d be freaking, too. Yikes!
Yeah it was so creepy. But I have recently determined that anytime she sleeps on the bed she will wake up and start growling. (she’s a bit blind). So she’ll growl at the dresser and the clothes in the closet and the computer chair. Bahahah. She sleeps on the floor now (where the bed blocks her view of the room) so I can actually get some sleep!
Oh man, I’ve so been there. Only I have cats instead of dogs so instead of warning me they’d probably go hide under the bed so my gruesome murder doesn’t interrupt their ‘me’ time. I loved the last line.
My dog would warn me and hide under the bed until the psycho left lol. She’s cute but she’s not brave, at all.
I love how the dog pulls me through this post. And BTW, I too sleep with a bat by my bed, but I only have a cat to point out where we sleep and where all the valuables are hidden to any intruder. Ellen
A cat would point that stuff out too. Sleeping with a bat by the bed is a very good idea, no one expects a bat to the head!
I have the worst time sleeping when my husband’s away! I don’t have a dog to fuel my paranoia, though. Probably just as well. I freak myself out really efficiently.
This made me laugh! Bahahaha. I’m good enough at doing it without the prompt from my dog too. Her growling just adds to my already insane anxiety. 🙂
That entire last paragraph is totally me. I have OCD, so whatever sets me off – big or small – I absolutely cannot let it go. Great job. Pulled me right in.
Thank you! I’m only paranoid when it comes to the safety of my family. If I start to drift off and realize I don’t remember if I locked the windows or not I HAVE to get up and check. Because God forbid someone did break in on the night I didn’t – I would never forgive myself!
Oh I hate it when something, the dog, a bad dream, a noise, wakes me up and I cannot get back to sleep no matter how I prowl, toss, or turn. Bah. No Rawhides for you dog.
It is so irritating, especially if you were sleeping so well!!
This is wonderfully descriptive, and I love the fact that your dog started it and then snoozes peacefully at the end. Great story!
I know right! Typical. She’s the one who started the whole thing and she doesnt even accompany me to investigae the rest of the house!!
Great story!
You took something that could have been brushed off as nothing and turned it into a story. A damn good one, at that!
I love the part your dog played in the story, and I love a lot of your descriptions. You worked the snot out of those 500 words, and it’s wonderful.
Awesome, awesome job.
Wow thanks Dawn! You just made my day! 🙂
Love the descriptions. I was thinking about the fact that you used the present tense, and how I ended up using that for last week’s post. I’m starting to think of that as a good tense for something that has happened in the past, happened in this instance, and you know it will happen again. It worked quite well, although it made that sentence a bit tricky for me to understand at first.
I love the flow of this. Glad to read your posts the last couple of weeks!
I know! I was wondering if anyone would comment and prepared myself for catching crappola from the judges lol. I tried to write this in the past tense but it just would NOT come out that way! So I figured well if this is how the story is working then I’ll just have to go with it! 99% of the time I write in past tense because it truly is the easier tense for me to work in, but I guess there are occasion when my stories want to take on a present tense to ramp up the action! Thanks for the comment!
That was my experience last week. It just wasn’t right the other way. Like I said, it seems perfectly appropriate when describing a repeating event, something ongoing.
Right! I think with something short like this the present tense (as long as utilized properly) is a perfectly acceptable tense. For longer pieces it probably wouldn’t work as well (although I know some authors prefer this tense).
I love the part about the dog setting you off. It’s creepy what they see, right? Also, I had to go into my basement last night when I was home alone which always scares me. I thought of you and your bat, beating your clothes 🙂
Lol, I hope that imagery helped you to laugh and relax. Whatever I can do to make people less paranoid of dark creepy spaces I consider a success. Bahahaha.
Oh, I can SO relate. I’m a major scaredy cat. This is a really fantastic post. You did such a great job capturing the grogginess of a midnight wake-up in the beginning and that last sentence is perfect!
I’m glad you liked it. The first couple lines are always the biggest pain in the butt for me. Thanks for the awesome compliments 🙂
Love the last line: “I descend into the gloom to fight the shadows and my imagination, while the dog lightly snores and the ceiling fan ticks down every second of lost sleep.” Having just been almost killed by my dog in the middle of the night, I relate 🙂
Dog are man’s best friend, apparently not woman’s!
Oh I’m glad I didn’t read this at night; you did too good a job of setting the scene! Luckily I have two crazy dogs who protect me because I’m their food source if for no other reason.
You are lucky. My dog would probably just naw at my corpse…
These things are so scary, especially if your jolted awake! I get creeped out when my husband isn’t there too. Loved loved loved the closing line!
Thanks so much! It is is scary when you are the lone protector of your house and kids! So many crazy stories in the news.
A very common moment to all of us, yet you still made it a compelling read. Great writing! Loved the dog 🙂
Thanks so much! 😀
Beautifully written! I could feel myself tensing up. My dog scares the crap out of me all the time. He’ll run to the door and start growling. I’m always torn between telling him to stop and urging him on to scare away the impending intruder.
LOL. i hear ya. I’m never sure if it’s a false alarm or not….100 percent of the time it has been…but you never know when the dummy will be right!! 🙂
I am also gifted with a wild imagination. it can be good, and it can be irrational!
So true. Imagination has helped me with many a writing projects and cursed me in the dead of night!
I love the natural, tiny detail of the bat next to the bed. Suggests that a)you’re a light sleeper; and b)this isn’t the first time it’s happened. Give the dog a doggie sleeping pill!
LOL. It wasnt the first time it’s happened. But the bat by the bed was spurned on by a REAL attempt at someone breaking into the house. A guy was breaking into house in the neighbourhood while people were sleeping and stealing their stuff before they woke up. I was awake when he tried to get into my house and the hubs sent out a patrol car. They didn’t catch the guy that night but a few weeks later they did.
Gaaaaah, I hate that! And I don’t have a dog to start the mess, or end it for that matter. Great descriptions! Well done.
Thank you very much 🙂