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I'm Not Insane, I'm Mentally Challenged
by Dana K

 It was back, standing in his room, staring at him.  He had thought the cat had chased it away.

 Gary sat up quickly on the bed and stared back.

 It began again . . . "Doo bee doobedooo . . ."

 "Ahhhh!"
 

 Suddenly, he was awake, sunlight splashing on his face, the radio spouting, "-is your traffic update: it's pretty rough with the rain out there today-"

 "Gair, are you okay?"  called Chuck from the closed door. "Let me in, Gary.  The cat's making weird faces at me."

 "Um . . ."  Gary got up, clad in shorts and a t-shirt, and turned off the radio.  Walking over to the door, he opened it and faced his friend and the orange cat that visited him daily.

 Chuck's blue eyes studied him with concern. "Are you okay?"

 "I . . . I don't know.  I guess so."  Gary stepped outside and grabbed the paper.  "You didn't read this, did you?"

 "No!  I did no such thing."  Chuck rushed in, holding a jar in his hands that went by mostly unnoticed by Gary.  "I heard you screaming, are you sure you're all right?"

 "Yeah, it was just a nightmare," Gary waved it off.

Chuck looked unconvinced.  "Just?  It wasn't that dream again . . ."

 Gary looked away with embarrassment.  "Yes, and I don't want to talk about it."  He turned away and headed for the closet.

 Chuck rolled his eyes and tried to suppress a smile.  "What was it this time?" he asked.

 Gary returned with his clothes.  "If you must know-"

 "I must."

 Gary continued, annoyed. "This time it was playing the violin. Then the cat began chasing it around, and attacked it."

 Chuck laughed, and popped something in his mouth.  "Cool.  So, was fur flying?"

 Gary frowned as he grabbed a towel.  "It doesn't have fur, it has feathers."

 "Okay, feathers flying."

 Gary's eyes narrowed thoughtfully.  "I thought the cat had killed it.  Unfortunately, it came back."

 Chuck shivered with amusement.  "Oooh, spooky.  Gair, you sure know how to freak yourself out."

 Gary glared at Chuck's less than witty sarcasm.  "Yeah, I know. See you downstairs."

 Gary's shower took little time, but he swore that over the sound of the rushing water, he could hear something, a faint noise . . .

"Doo bee dobedooo . . ."

 Quickly shutting off the water, Gary flung open the shower door, ready to meet whatever was out there . . .  and found nothing.  Grabbing the towel and wrapping it around him, he muttered, "What the hell is going on?"

 He stepped out of the shower--
 
And cried out as his feet slid out from under him.  Whack!  He landed on his back, upon the floor.

 "Uhhh . . ." he moaned, rubbing his head as he stared at the ceiling. "This is not my day."  Then, he realized that the ground he was lying on was anything but flat. There was a pebbly feeling to it . . . .

With a pained frown, Gary sat up and looked at the floor of the bathroom. "What-who did this?"

 Underneath him and scattered all around the bathroom floor were multicolored round things.

 "Jellybeans.  I hate jellybeans!  Chuck!!!"  Gary stood, and began picking the sticky beans from his towel: for when he had sat on them, their sugary innards had melded to the fabric.

 Shaking his head, he looked through the open bathroom door into the living room, and saw the cat sitting atop the coffee table serenely. Scattered around the cat, all over the floor, were jellybeans.  And next to the cat, on the table, was a overturned jar.  And EMPTY overturned jar.

 "CHUCK!!"  Gary exclaimed, grabbing his clothes and changing as quickly as he could.  When he was almost fully dressed, he rushed into the living room, just as Chuck walked through the doorway.

 "Hey, Gair, what's . . ." Chuck's eyes fell on the jellybeans.  "Uh oh."

 Gary's eyes burned into Chuck's as he pulled his t-shirt on.  "You left these in here when you came up today, didn't you?  And then you went downstairs, and I took a shower, and the cat . . ."

 "Meow?"  the cat said, uncaring that Gary was about to explode from anger.

 Chuck began to back away, his hands raised.  "I didn't do anything. I swear.  It was the cat, not me."

 "You know the cat likes jellybeans!" Gary raged, drawing closer to Chuck.  "See?"

 Chuck's gaze traveled down Gary's arm to where his finger was pointing, and fell upon the cat.  She sat nibbling daintily upon a green jellybean on the coffee table.

 Gary threw his bean-covered towel at Chuck, who caught it on reflex.  "You're going to clean up this mess, Chuck.  I can't believe you did this."

 "Gary," Chuck pleaded, "I'm sorry, I forgot, I--"

 "Wait."  Gary's brow furrowed as he turned his head. "I heard something."
 
Someone was slowly walking up the stairs.  And then they heard it:  "Doo bee dobedoooo . . ."

 Chuck and Gary looked at each other frantically.  Gary ran a hand through his wet hair and whispered, "I must be going crazy.  Did you hear that?"

 "YES!" Chuck hissed, already beginning to cringe defensively.

"What are we going to do?!"

"I don't know!"

 "Wait," Chuck said, "hit it with the umbrella!"  He grabbed the black umbrella resting against the coat rack, and they crouched against the partly opened door.

 The slow footsteps said again, "Doo bee dobedoooo . . ."

 Gary shivered, his pulse racing,  but called, "Now!"

 They jumped from there hiding place, whammed the door back (hitting the bicycle hanging on the wall) and saw . . . Marissa.

 Her brown eyes frowned at them. "What the hell are you doing, guys? Whatever that thing is that you're waving around, get it away from me!  You could kill someone!"

 Gary sighed and leaned against the wall.  "We thought you were someone else."

 Marissa laughed sharply. "Who?"

 Chuck and Gary looked at each other, then Chuck spoke up.  "You don't want to know."

 "Marissa," Gary said, holding his chest as his heart beat slowly returned to normal, "Why were you humming?"

 She smiled, and said, "Well, my friend was telling me about that Bud Light commercial.  I finally found out that the person humming was a penguin.  Isn't that cute?  A penguin!"  She turned and walked back down the stairs.

 Gary and Chuck slowly slid to the floor and glanced at each other.  "Yeah." Gary sighed.  "Real cute."

    THE END

Email the author: Dana K
 
 

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