SQUIRRELLY

I shouldn't read scary books before going to bed. 

I often scare myself into thinking that there may be someone outside the windows at night.  I don't know why.  I mean, I don't own anything worth stealing, and I have two lights on the side of my townhouse that make it daytime all night long.  Currently I am reading a novel about someone lurking at night in the bushes outside a woman's window.  Turns out the character is a lunatic, kidnaps the woman, and locks her in a cottage rigged with explosives. 

Right.  So it's a realistic story.

Anyway, it puts me on edge so much that I can't sleep more than six hours straight without getting up, opening all of the windows nice and wide, and snoozing for another hour or two.  In other words, apparently it doesn't bother me in the slightest.  At least, not until the following morning.

In the morning, I am sitting at my kitchen table doing some work.  To be fair, I was sitting in this exact location when a piece of metal shrapnel (attached to a bullet-riddled Dunkin Donuts old-style plastic travel mug) came flying off the roof and whizzed by that very window, causing me to jump clear out of my own skin and back again.  So, I'm sitting there, minding my own damn business, when someone starts rattling around in my recycling bin.

This is not the first time someone has tampered with the recycling bin.  However, it is the first time any of the local winos has actually walked onto my patio to rummage around.  I semi-peek through the curtain of another window nearby. 

I can't see anyone.

Then my mind goes to the dark place:  Oh, damn; the river rats are back, although I am forced to accept that the river rats never make it out of the backyard nor the gulley beyond and really have no business at all on my patio.  As a matter of fact, I haven't seen a river rat in the yard since the neighbor's dog died and the endless food supply of doodoo dried up (so to speak). 

I surreptitiously peer through the shade that rests on the top of the air conditioner.  And that's when I spy him.  Squirrelly.

Squirrelly is sitting atop a trash can, leaning into my recycle bin, and going through the stuff that's in it.  It seems he has been hired by the local bums to do their dirty work for them.  They probably promised him a cache of acorns when the season's over.

While I'm not at all pleased that Squirrelly has suddenly developed an affinity for flattened plastic, I have to admit I'm rather delighted.  Squirrelly isn't like the other rodents; Squirrelly has miniature cajones of steel.  The other squirrels who've taken up residence here are no match for Squirrelly.  When he's angry or involved in a fight, people in the entire neighborhood can hear the chattering and hissing.  There's a fence along the patio, about six feet away from the house.  Squirrelly likes to run along the fence, patrolling his little squirrel real estate that stretches from his tree right outside the boys' bedroom windows to wherever he damn well pleases.  Once when I had a welcome mat hanging over the fence to dry, Squirrelly felt welcome enough to run onto it, stop, balance himself, then pee all over my carpet.  It was as hilarious as it was absolutely inane.

Squirrelly fears no one and nothing.  When I open the door, he simply stands his ground and stares me down.  I am actually terrified that if I leave the door open too long, Squirrelly will march right inside and pee on the indoor carpet, too.  Once he is sufficiently bored with me, he returns to the recycling bin, turning over bottles and cans, seemingly disappointed that I don't have anything more exciting, like an empty tuna can or any Haffenreffer private stock malt liquor bottles hiding in there.

After about a minute of this routine, I grab my cell phone so I can take Squirrelly's picture.  He usually sits and poses for the press, but today he's shy.  As soon as I step forward, he's off like a shot.  I don't see him again all day, not when I'm sitting in the sun reading, nor later when I go to sit in the shade.  He's not out there when the wind kicks up and I rearrange the chairs against the fence so they don't blow off the patio into river rat territory.  He's probably bored with me -- I'm too easy a mark.

Besides, he's already scared the buhjeezus out of me by picking through my discarded bottles and cans on the morning after I read a "scared from the noises outside the window" book.  He probably doesn't have an encore prepared, and I'm not sure I have another pair of clean underwear handy, anyway.