Page 21 of Perfect Mess

“No, the other thing.”

“What other thing?”

“Listen.”

At first I heard nothing. Then I did hear it. But I had to hear it a second time before I could wrap my head around what I heard.

Meow

My ceiling was meowing. The sound was faint, but unmistakable. Then I heard more sounds. Scurrying footsteps. Random thumps. The gnawing of tooth and claw on exposed wood.

Meow

A creature had infiltrated Aunt Catherine’s home. Gary returned from his van with a ladder, two flashlights, and a thick pair of gloves.

I had been hoping for a bazooka and a flamethrower. Vagrant vermin haunting the attic were even worse for resale value than ugly kitchen wallpaper and red walls. The beast had to go.

“Where’s the attic?” Gary asked.

I pointed up.

Gary rolled his eyes. “I mean the access door to the attic.”

After a quick search, we found the access door in the hallway ceiling. And by “we”, I mean Gary. He set his ladder underneath.

“Can you hold this for me?” I held on to the ladder with both hands. When he climbed to the top, I got a good view of his butt. I pretended to read one of the warning labels on the ladder step when he looked down at me. “You better take a look.”I have been.

The inside of the attic was dark, hot, and smelled like buffalo. We scanned the darkened corners with our flashlights. The space was tight, so Gary had to get down on all fours to venture deeper. I looked at his butt again.

“A lot of old boxes up here.” Gary’s flashlight illuminated a wall of boxes stacked floor to ceiling. “Was your aunt ever featured on one of those hoarder shows?”

“No,” I said. “But she was a guest one time on a public access show about knitting.”

I hadn’t even known the boxes were there. After the house cleared probate, I did a massive purge, packing anything sentimental into storage, to be given away or thrown away later. I hired an estate company to sell off the rest. The only piece of furniture left was Aunt Catherine’s bed, because apparently no one wanted a dead woman’s old mattress. It was still sitting in the bedroom.

I took a step toward the boxes, planning to investigate.

Creak

“Careful,” Gary warned. “These old houses can be tricky. Make sure you step on the crossbeams so you don’t fall through.”

Sticking to the narrow lengths of wood was easier said than done. You’d have to be an Olympic gymnast and a contortionist to navigate all the rafters and ceiling joists.

“There! I think I saw something!” Gary pointed with his flashlight. I swept my flashlight over, but the only thing I saw were shadows. Whatever critter was lurking here, it must have had extensive ninja training.

I put my hand on a support beam to steady myself and came away with a fistful of spider webs. The place gave me the creeps. I just wanted to find the invader, extract it, then get the heck out.

Meow

The sound was louder now. Like it was close. Like it was watching us. And waiting for the chance to leap out of the darkness and devour us whole. “Sounds like a cat,” Gary said.

“What kind of cat though? Bobcat? Wild cat? Panther?”

We both turned when the sound of scurrying came from the far corner. “Sounds like it’s coming from over there.” Gary aimed his light toward the farthest corner of the attic. The darkness swallowed it whole. “One of us should check it out.” I looked at Gary and he looked at me. Neither one of us moved. Gary sighed. “Fine.”

The roof slanted sharply the deeper we went. Gary had to get down on all fours and belly crawl to get underneath the angled timbers. While Gary played Twister with the support beams, I decided that the best thing for me to do was keep looking at his butt.

Eventually, Gary got tangled up in a crisscross of two by fours. “I can’t get all the way over there,” he said. “I’m too big.” He looked back at me expectantly. As in, expecting me to crawl over and join him.

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