The Night You Awoke Screaming!
“Man does not live by a turkey in every oven or a color TV set in every home. Man lives by faith and hope and love, by the star on the horizon and by the trumpet that will not call retreat.”
----- E. Merrill Root
The Night You Awoke Screaming!
It had been raining for a couple of days. It was a steady rain with periods of real downpour.
The rain curtains would suddenly appear and march across the landscape of your favorite little town site of Cocoli. You were on vacation leave from your ship after spending seven months on deployment in the Middle East. You were really thrilled to be home in paradise and enjoying some real quality time. A tropical depression had centered itself a few hundred miles to the north of Panama just off the coast of Costa Rica. The weather patterns had change some this passed year because of something everybody was calling “El Nino” phenomena.
Wow, how could a little kid do so much mischief? Well, there had been some flooding and some strong winds that had blown a few tin roofs off some houses in Panama City, but here all was secure and safe. The rain tippee-tapping on the zinc roofs of these tropical quarters was music to the ears. It was a regular Calliope of sounds. What a wonderful way to unwinding from the high stress duty of serving on a US Navy Destroyer in the Middle East. Then about nightfall the rain stopped.
That night, I turned in rather early. I had been reading a Stephen King novel about a super flu. What a great imagination this fantastic storyteller had for taking simple events and converting them into the strange and the macabre.
About 10:30 PM my eyes got very heavy so I turned off the reading light and fell into a deep and restful sleep. Around midnight I thought I heard a scratching sound outside my bedroom door. I figured it was nothing as the Grandfather Clock in the hall chimed midnight. As always I could sleep through almost any noise. I guess even a sanitation waste removable truck driving through a nitroglycerin factory would not have awakened me. I was still trying to recover from jet lag and the time change from the Middle East.
A little later I faintly heard what appeared to be a low moaning coming from the other side of the close door. I knew it couldn’t be my golden retriever “Bullet” for he was over at my brother’s house in Diablo. The sound of moaning and scratching got louder and then stopped. When it started again there seem to be a whipping sound and it was starting to spook me. I tiptoed to the closet and got my 12 Gauge Winchester Pump Shotgun just in case. I chambered a round and crawled back into bed. It sort of calmed me down. I was falling asleep again when the scratching and moaning began again but now besides the whipping sound there seemed to be a noise of something heavy being dragged across the wood floor and the sounds of chains. The sounds got closer and closer and they also got louder and louder!
My eyes had adjusted to the pitch-black darkness of the room. I dropped to the floor as I got out of my bed. I figured whatever it was on the other side of the door would first go for the bed first. I would then have a clear shot and take whatever it was down. I was now thinking monster as the sound being produced included a hissing and cackling sound coming from the depths of some ungodly cavern of sorts. I again pinch myself to see if I could be having a nightmare. Not a chance…it was real and I was living the scary nightmare. I could feel the nearness of the “THING” on the other side of the door. What to do? Should I yell out and give away my position or fire first and ask questions later. I tore off the wrapper of a Wrigley Juicy fruit Gum and put the whole stick in my mouth and began to chew. I felt around under my bed and found my 8 cell Police Special Maga-lite. I was ready!
The doorknob began to turn…whatever was going to happen would happen in the next couple of seconds. I then saw what appeared to be two huge shadows standing in the doorway. One carried what appeared to be a crowbar and the other an ax that was dripping some type of gooey liquid.
They dragged themselves into the room. I could smell the putrid and swamp gas smell that had engulfed the room. It was enough to gag a maggot! As they lifted the ax and crowbar to strike what appeared to be a peaceful sleeping figure on the bed, I brought the shotgun to bear, the barrel got tangled in the bedsprings as I fired off the first round. In the close bedroom it sounded like a dump Truck working on the 3rd Set of Locks project had dropped its load in my bedroom. At that point the monsters turned in my direction with their eyes flaming red and their mouths spitting an awful gooey smelling liquid out of the corners of their mouths. I turn my maga-lite on and they froze in the glare of the light like to prehistoric creatures from the past…Oh, my! Like the “Night of the Living Dead” and I was one of the main characters…. or maybe the their next victim!
This could not be happening! I bit my upper lip and said to myself this will not happen to me! At that point the two creatures fell upon me as I let out with gurgling screams that came from down deep within my little body!
All of a sudden, thinking it was curtains; I suddenly awoke tangled up in my bedding! Thank you God!
That would be the last time I would eat some Chocolate pudding before retiring. Oh, it was so good to be alive and alone in my bedroom as I heard my mother yell from her bedroom, “Are you all right Kid? Say something!”
I quickly answered, “I am okay. It was only an awful nightmare.” My Mother than said, “You best get to sleep Kid, I got a few errands I want you to run for me in the morning. Your Dad can’t do them. He had to remain at work to take care of an emergency. Goodnight Kid.”
