Under the Bed

It has been three minutes. The only thing I can see is the bottom part of the bureau on my left, a hint of the tallboy ahead and the book shelf on the right. I think I could see the bedside table if I twist my head far back.

But I’m crushed into a ball by the large under bed drawer. I’m so glad I clean under the bed. The mosaic floor is hot under my cheek.

It had to be my luck. I’m trapped under my bed in the hottest room in the house, in the middle of July and I have no clue on how to escape The Thing Sleeping on The Bed.

I can’t believe it. I CANNOT. I choose to sleep in my room after a few months, abandoning the calm cool of the guest room downstairs and my bed is hijacked.

I love my room, I really do. But it gets amazingly hot. It has windows on two sides that let in sunlight from sun up till sun down. So, being a reasonably sensible person, I shift to the very cool (but incredibly Spartan) room downstairs. My parents are happy, I’m happy, everyone’s happy. Even the Thing That is Sleeping on My Bed Right Now.

I spend the entire morning rearranging, dusting and polishing, only to be kicked off MY bed by Something.

“Don’t worry. I only want to sleep. I’ll be gone by morning. Just don’t get out from under there.”

I’m not worrying. I’m not worrying at all. Who’d be worried if they were trapped under their own bed by Something that’s only there to sleep the night out?

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!

Oh good. I’m only going to scream in my head. Doesn’t matter how many brain cells get fried in the process.

“I like your room. The horrendous pink color tints the shadows quite nicely. I never realized that from under the bed.”

Oh, thank you. No, wait.

Can it be…

The Thing on The Bed used to be The Thing Under the Bed?

Ahh. Is it always so cramped for Monsters Under the Bed? I ask.

“Not really. Most are custom made for the particular space they are supposed to haunt. I got too big for it because you gave me no trouble. You sleep like the dead.”

The takes me back to all the memorable instances that people relate to me about my sleeping habits. I could sleep through a nuclear explosion. But of course, after THAT, I’d stay asleep.

Forever!

Back to current problem.

When do I return to the other side of the mattress?

The Thing told me that I would have to bear it till Management found It a new haunt.

People are pretty much impossible to scare once they are All Grown Up. It’s when they are eighteen (or any age at which the people around them start telling them contemptuously to ‘grow up’), that Grown up’s tell them the Golden Words:

RESPOSIBILITY

COMMON SENSE

Childhood fears have little living space besides these. So turn off the night light and grow up.

But spend a few nights under your bed waiting for the Thing Sleeping on The Bed to be assigned a new under bed by Management.

Five hours, thirty-four minutes left till dawn.

Good night.

Good night you sensible fool.