Life With A Werewolf

Gnome Sweet Gnome

         The lesson to be learned here is this: never buy lawn gnomes at yard sales. I'll say that again: NEVER BUY LAWN GNOMES AT YARD SALES. It just doesn't pan out all that well, and can be the start of an all out invasion. It hasn't come to barb wire and siege towers yet, but honestly I think we're not a long way off from that.

         Things all started with yard sale season. If you're not familiar, yard sale season kicks off right around summer and goes until it's just far too damn cold to sit outside any longer to hock your useless stuff onto unsuspecting early morning shoppers. The little community we live near has a weekend every year where they go all out for yard sales. Stretching from one lawn to the next, street after street, block after block, you could spend, well.... it's not a very big community so forty five minutes at least going through yard sales looking at all the neat stuff people are willing to part with now that it's outlived its usefulness to them, or someone moved out/died, or it broke or whatever.

         That was what I was doing that morning, moving from yard to garage carefully picking through everyone's piles of stuff trying to find the gold mine within the rubbish. Crash had a late night adventure of some kind or another that he was still on, and would get home about an hour after I had left. I had imagined it had something to do with his centaur boss and or something but honestly I had no clue really and didn't ask because, what's the fun in that? I'd rather just guess and make it up as I go along.

         After touring blankets piled high with baby clothing bought new and barely worn, (and saying 'kid's grow fast, don't they?' for about a billion times) and witnessing box and crate after box and crate filled with records from people who must have been local favorites at one point but now no one in their life could remember who the heck these people were, I'd stumbled across something.

         It was a lawn gnome. He had on a little pair of sunglasses, a leather jacket, and his arms crossed in front of him like he was posing as if he was tough or something. The darn thing made me giggle when I saw it, which is difficult for a lawn gnome to do. In my head I had visions of a moving lawn gnome, first starting in one part of the yard, then the next. Slowly a few inches a day here and there. That is until Crash Sean, Zack and the rest would start asking themselves if they were going insane or if that thing was moving.

         Was it a dumb idea? Perhaps. But remember, I'm not the one who stood in the kitchen eating Reese's Peanut Butter Puffs out of a dogfood bag. So, he had it coming. Besides it wasn't like anything was going to happen, right? Gnome gets moved around, people ask 'am I crazy or is that thing moving?', I pretend to not know, and see how long it takes before they crack or catch me.

         That was my original intension when I brought it home and set it up near the woods by our property. It was visible from the road, looked cute and funny in that weird kitschy sort of way your strange aunt with all the cats and figurines is. It didn't exactly bring "class" to the house, but then again my forgotten relic of a car, and the grass that's always over grown doesn't bring much class either. Besides, if you remember my last post, class is not something I concern myself too much with.

         Crash was less than enthusiastic about our latest addition to the landscaping. I expected some hemms and haws. Maybe a joke or two about my taste in figurines or perhaps one or two jokes about me becoming a stereotypical housewife from the eighties. I didn't expect the 'what the hell' moment that I got.

         He came crashing through the door, a sneer on his face. He was covered in dirt and mud this time, as well as another substance that smelled a bit like sewage if sewage wanted to stink. "What the hell is that thing doing in our yard," he growled.

         "Oh, the gnome," I asked, trying my best to sound innocent.

         "No, the water fountain in the back next to the olympic sized pool," he said, rolling his eyes. "Yes the gnome!"

         "I saw it at a yard sale, and thought" I began.

         "That you'd pollute our yard and the entire neighborhood," he replied dryly.

         "You mad," I asked, a bit confused now. I mean, sure lawn gnomes are a bit cheesy, but we're a bit of a cheesy group. From Zack's Minecraft Halloween decorations to Kris and Sean's unique taste on Christmas (think 'Frozen' meets 'Nightmare before Christmas'), and of course me and Crash ourselves, we have a delightfully unique take on just about everything. We're the ones who could have endless hours of debates about what exactly it would sound like if Talking Heads suddenly decided to become a Slipknot style metal band, for example complete with lyrics and song titles. Since when was something too cheesy for us?

         "I'm not mad," he replied finally. His shoulders had slumped forward, his face was dark with that subtle defeated look that we all get at the end of a hard day. "Just a long day at the office, and now, that thing." He threw a thumb up over his shoulder towards the yard.
It's strange. I swear the damn Gnome was glaring into the house just then. His arms crossed, the sunglasses on his face peering at us through the windows with, well hate. I wrote it off at the time to my overactive imagination. "When you've had your fun with him, let me know and I'll take care of it," he sighed, and shuffled through the kitchen towards the shower.

         The strangeness began almost the next day. I went outside to begin my prank. I was going to move the gnome just a few inches from it's spot by the large oak tree near the path through the woods towards the house. If they let me, I would inch it up to the door step, and practically inside the house. However, instead of standing next to the woods, it was now over near the garage. Near the woods was a female lawn gnome. She was complete with hat, large bashful eyes and a blush, as if being courted by my original lawn gnome. He was turned slightly towards her, and I swear he had a 'come hither to' smile on his face.

         "Very funny," I grumbled, and turned around to go back inside. At the time, I figured it was Crash pranking me. Ceramic and plaster doesn't exactly just get up on it's own and begin moving around the yard by itself, does it? That's not the way physics work, at least not in this world. It could be Zack, but honestly video games are more his speed. If it was him, I'd expect the gnome to suddenly look like a character out of Zelda or Halo or something. So, it had to be Crash, didn't it? I don't know where he found the time to get the gnomes or even where
he got them from, but it had to be him.

         Upon seeing this, I rolled my eyes, and went back inside. How the heck was I defeated in my own prank even before I started it? Am I really that predictable? It's as if he not only stole my entire play book, but rewrote every bit of it, Xeroxed it, and gave it back to me.
The female and male lawn gnomes moved around a bit in the yard every day. At one point he moved away from the garage, towards the female. At another they were holding hands and kissing. As they were kissing another female lawn gnome appeared at the entrance towards the woods. "That freaking hairball," I growled. Taking a picture, I texted "very funny" to Crash.

         His only response was "Say uncle and I'll take care of it."

         I glared at the screen. "Screw you," I muttered. I could ignore it far longer than he could. Push comes to shove, I can take care of it.
It went back and forth like this for a few days more. The gnomes began to multiply. As the first female began to swell up day by day, the other female was being held by the gnome. Then came male gnomes. small kid gnomes. Little ceramic carrots being planted in the front of the house by gnomes. The whole entire works. "Oh, what the hell," I grumbled looking at them.

         We had started off with one. Now, if I counted the number would be closer to thirty. They were multiplying faster than rabbits! I began seeing little ceramic men in my dreams wearing pointy hats and threatening me with ceramic knives. They would speak a gibberish language that I didn't understand.

         I awoke that morning, groggy. It was now approximately three weeks into Gnome ownership, or gnomership as I began calling it, feeling more like an owner of a ceramic petting zoo at this point than the proud over of a strange lawn statue that was supposed to be a funny prank for me, but completely backfiring instead. Shuffling from my bedroom into the kitchen, I gave a big yawn as I prepared myself a cup of coffee. I would need it extra strong this morning.

         "You look like hell," Crash replied, smiling at me from his usual chair at the table by the window. He had a steaming coffee cup in front of him and a half eaten bowl of cereal before him. It appeared that he was looking out into the yard at the lawn gnomes. One was in the process of mooning the window, another giving us the finger. Cute.

         "I had dreams of lawn gnomes attacking me," I grumbled.

         "Could you understand them," Crash asked.

         "No, they were speaking gibberish," I replied, unsure of where this was going.

         "Good," he said, then took another bite of cereal. "You ready to give in?"

         "no," I growled, "especially since I know it's you moving them around. I don't know where you're finding all of these stupid figurines, but I know it's you."

         "no, not me." He replied. "They move themselves."

         Not this crap again. "Sure. They come alive under the moonlight to terrorize us."

         "Well, mostly play pranks." He replied. 'But, that one you got there is a trouble maker."

         "Pranks aren't trouble," I asked.

         He shook his head. "No, not usually. They'll saran wrap your toilet seat or put peanut butter in your tooth paste, things like that."

         "Peanut butter in the tooth paste?" That just sounded weird.

         Crash shrugged. "They think it's funny. But Kheid out there, he's dangerous. Hates humans. Wants to eradicate us all."

         "Crash, you're making no sense here," I replied, visibly confused. After all, he named the damn thing Kheid. I've got a lawn gnome army out there. Well, at least a lawn gnome platoon. Twenty something of them, planting things, reaping things, lawn gnome kids running around, all being over seen by a gnome that strangely has no chin beard, but has the pointed hat, sun glasses, a leather jacket, and now a pistol and grenade rounds in a sling wrapped around itself like it's a one gnome army. You know Rambo? This thing now looks like Ram-gnome.

         "Like I said, when you're ready to all it quits, let me know. I'll take care of them. And when you can understand them, especially let them
know." I rolled my eyes at his words. Now, he's just being silly, I thought, then walked back into my room to start my day of writing and reading.

         I wrote the entire thing off really. After all, Crash works at night and has a lot of time on his hands. Err...paws. Or whatever form he's in when he works at night. He could easily be moving gnomes around before work trying to throw me off. Slowly adding to the collection in time to make me think I'm crazy. Right?

         But that one gnome, the leather daddy Gnome named Kheid, he seems to no longer be kidding or playful. There is no smile full of humor on his face in the mornings like the other gnomes. And slowly as their numbers grow each one of them begins to look more and more sinister. As if they're ready to come after us.

         So, either this will end with Crash laughing at me after he's driven me bonkers, or a lawn full of broken lawn gnomes, or we will all be forced to recognize the power of our new pointy hatted over lords. One of those three things will happen. Either way, I've made my piece with it. And no, the cocked hand gun near my bedside isn't because now I'm paranoid.

         All of this trouble because I tried to start one prank. Next time I'm just replacing his shampoo with nair or putting toothpaste on his door knob or something. All of this trouble. No lawn gnomes. No more of this! This prank has gone absolutely no where. Lawn gnomes just aren't worth the trouble.