Originally Published in Jest Magazine
DAY 1: The movers finished bringing in the last of the stuff. Everything’s still in boxes, but I’m glad the move is over. It’ll take a few days to get everything in place, but already it feels like home. The house is in pretty good shape. There are some strange holes at the bottom of the walls that I didn’t notice before. I’ll have to plaster them up. Matt and Kelly are playing outside. The backyard’s so big. Pretty soon Matt will be bringing friends over and playing ball in the backyard. There’s also a weird noise coming from the vents. Might have to have a heater/AC guy come take a look at the ventilation. DAY 5: The noise in the vents has gradually gotten louder, particularly at night. Definitely going to have to call somebody about that. Last night Matt and Kelly ran into the bedroom screaming about something they saw run across the floor. Kids and their nightmares. Pretty soon they’ll be talking about things under the bed. We let them sleep with us. DAY 7: The ventilation guy couldn’t find anything wrong, but the noise just keeps getting louder. The kids are too frightened to stay in their own room and have taken to sleeping with us for the past three nights. They say they keep seeing little monsters in their room? Even Wendy claims she saw something moving down the basement when she was putting stuff away. We might have rats. That would be terrible. DAY 10: Wendy had an exterminator come while I was at work today. She left him here alone while she went shopping. When she came back he was gone. She hadn’t even paid him. She shouldn’t have done that. You can’t trust these guys. I’m sure they’ll send us a bill in the mail. I’m not going to pay though. They didn’t get rid of the rats. If anything they are getting louder. We’re all having trouble sleeping and are a bit on edge. I had a nightcap last night to take the edge off. I could have sworn I heard the strangest thing. It sounded like a burp. DAY 11: I know this sounds insane, but I don’t think we have rats. I saw something last night and it definitely wasn’t a rat. Maybe there was a little too much Gin in my tonic. DAY 12: Kelly said the strangest thing last night at dinner. “Don’t fear the Raknar.” When I asked her what that meant she said that the little people living in the walls said it. She’s not scared anymore and said she wanted to sleep in her own bed again, but I wouldn’t let her. DAY 13: Yesterday, Matt said that two “tiny gray man-like guys” came out from behind the TV and talked to him for a while. When I asked him what they talked about he said, “Just stuff.” Then he said, “I think the Raknar are kinda cool.” Apparently that’s what they told him their name was. Matt said he wasn’t scared anymore either and was okay with going back to his room. I told Wendy that night that we might want to think about moving. She didn’t answer or at least I don’t think she did. I may have had a couple drinks. DAY 14: I wasn’t looking forward to going home last night after work so I stayed out and had a few drinks. When I got home, the kids were fast asleep in their own room. I was angry that Wendy let them sleep there alone. Then I stepped into our bedroom. Wendy was under the covers. She was moaning and the covers were heaving up and down. I ripped the sheets off the bed to find three of the Raknar climbing over her body, one between her legs and two across her belly and breasts. I swatted one with a half-empty bottle of Jack Daniels and the other two jumped off the bed. All three of them scurried into one of the holes in the wall before I could get my hands on them. Wendy started yelling. She asked me what the hell I was doing. When I said I was saving her, she bellowed, “From what, having an orgasm for once?” Then she screamed, “The Raknar are more of a man than you could ever be- and they’re not even human!” Then she called me a drunken bastard and made me sleep on the couch. I said something about this being my house and when the Raknar start paying the bills they can do something or other. The next morning I woke up in the hallway. I was late for work. DAY 15: When I got home the next day Wendy’s car wasn’t in the driveway, but she was in the kitchen cooking dinner. I asked where the car was and she told me that the Raknar had gone to the store to pick up some things for dinner. Apparently, they can drive if one of them works the pedals while the other two man the steering wheel. I left the kitchen as Wendy went on about how impressed she was by them. The kids were in the living room watching TV. I told them that there were bad things happening in the house right now and their mom was a little sick. I said we were going to have to move. This upset them. Apparently, the Raknar have been helping Kelly with her math homework because I’ve been “too grumpy” when I come home from work. I also found out that Matt was having problems with bullies at school until the Raknar ate one of them. He said it was a lot better than me just saying “stand up for yourself” and to “stop being such a wimp.” Did I really say that? Kelly said my breath was stinky and she didn’t like my new beard. I guess I haven’t shaved in a while. DAY 16: I tried to talk to Wendy last night. I told her we could easily find a new place with our savings, maybe not as big or as nice as this, but far away from the Raknar. She said she liked it here and had no intention of moving. Then she said we couldn’t do it anyway because the Raknar sold off the last of my AOL/Time Warner stock and invested it in a Hedge Fund of their own creation based upon foreign currency fluctuation so our savings would be tied up for awhile. Then she got up and went to bed. I turned around my bottle of Jim Beam on the kitchen table so the label faced me. I said, “They’ve all abandoned me. You’d never leave me. Would you Jim?” Jim didn’t answer. DAY 17: I didn’t go to work yesterday. In fact I haven’t gone in for several days now. Still, I came home around six as if I did. I stepped into the living room to find six chairs placed in a circle. Sitting in the chairs were Wendy, Matt, Kelly and the three Raknar. Wendy told me everyone was concerned about me and that the Raknar suggested this intervention. She said that it would give us all a chance to talk about how my behavior had affected them, and how I needed to go to rehab. The Raknar were willing to drive. Enraged, I told them all to go fuck themselves. Kelly and Matt started crying. I lunged forward to strangle one of those tiny gray bastards, but they move like lightning. Before I knew it, one of them had my arm pinned behind my back and the three of them manhandled me out the front door. Anyway, that’s the story. Since then, I’ve been living at The Comfort Inn and let me tell you, it’d be a lot more comfortable if they had a fucking mini-bar. I hope you’ve learned something from this. Beware of those little gray pricks. They’ll tear your family apart. |