I’m afraid

…to go into my garage.

Yesterday morning, while tooling along at around 55-60 MPH on the dark, country road that is my daily commute, a raccoon ran out into my path. Like, we met inches away. There was no stopping or swerving. I just nailed him, ugly bumping sounds and all.

Of course, I kept going, but as I did, I realized, to my horror, that well…he was still with me. Or at least parts of him were, jangling about inside my wheel well on the front driver’s side, probably six inches from my left foot when I engage the clutch. Around and around and around.

After another few hundred feet of ugliness, the sound seemed to quiet down, but then there’s the hisss, hisss, hisss of something like fur *gag* shmushing inside the space above the tire.

I got to school in the dark, and refused to get out a flashlight and check it out. I high-tailed it into my classroom and began the day, and sort of forgot about it.

Then I got in the car at 8:30 p.m. to go home from rehearsal. My friend was back.

I thought maybe if I wankled the wheel back and forth on the road, I’d dislodge him. Nothin’ doin’. I just looked like a moron, unable to control my vehicle. When I turned back onto the country rooooaaad that takes me hoooome, it returned with a vengeance. It was now a bloated zombie, desperately clawing to come up through the body of the car and attack my left foot as I depressed the clutch. You know, like when I was little and I had a lesson in school about Abraham Lincoln getting shot, and I had a waking nightmare for years about him being under my bed, waiting to grab my feet.

(About now, you’re thinking “psychoanalysis…”)

I panicked. I didn’t stop driving, but rather had the mobile version of a freakout. I pressed the “talk” button and texted the Thriller:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There was no response. hahaha

By the time I neared my house, however, the noise had subsided. I pulled into the garage (still didn’t check anything — no way) and decided that he must have dropped off in the last five miles or so. But as I sit here at 5:27 a.m., I am haunted by the feeling:

He’s out there, waiting. The thing with bloody fur and half a face but a full rack of pointy teeth lies in wait for me to put my foot on the clutch.

If I don’t see you again…

:P

5 thoughts on “I’m afraid

  1. Mavis

    LOL! :-) Poor dear! Sorry for laughing. *ahem*. I liken your eerie prose to that of the great SK. Get the Thriller up and have him go out there and check! This is going to haunt you for a long time, isn’t it. Just like good old Abe when you were little. Think of it like this – that poor old raccoon is in a better place. With a perfect body. That’s all I got.

    Reply
  2. Kay

    I agree with Cheryl, in your spare time you need to write scary books [you don’t need to send me my complimentary copy, you know I am morally opposed to being scared] those little critters can cause some damage ~ please be careful

    Reply
  3. David

    That’s why the unreal phenomenon happened the other day…raccoons all over the Country were howling at the moonless night sky. At first it was thought that lycanthropes had reawakened but then the wailing became discernible “Rocky is dead!”

    Reply
  4. RD

    Awaiting the next chapter! Will it arise? If so in what metamorphosized form. Will it offer forgiveness or retribution? Etc?

    Reply
  5. Greg McDonald

    Similar experience last summer but with a bird! I was unaware that I’d nailed it until one warm morning as I opened the garage, the smell hit me. I thought some animal had died in the garage! After a brief investigation, I realized the feathered one had been “creamed” inside the radiator space. Couldn’t shake it loose and remove it with a dowel and ended up going to the car wash, sticking a handful of quarters in the slot and blasting out the parts that were left with the high pressure hose! That’s a possibility for you (or probably Michael!).

    Reply

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