No thanks. I'll stay outside.

My roommate came home from work tonight around 8. His girlfriend and the kids came home around 7:31. In the 29 minutes before he came home and the others arrived, I thought that my life was over. You see, I had gone to sleep downstairs on the brown couch. It is a comfy couch and that room is usually unoccupied when just me and my roommate are alone in the house. He works longer hours when they are gone, too, meaning that I have incredible stretches of peace and quiet.

The roommate came home around 2 p.m. today to eat lunch, watch some of the first round of the NCAA Basketball Tournament, and to change into his coat and tie for some type of special event at work tonight. He was gone again by 4, but I realized that after he had gone back to the office, I had forgotten to ask him when the others were going to return home today. However, I didn't lose to much sleep over forgetting to ask (literally)!

Around 7:28, I heard a vehicle in the garage. I have memorized the sounds of the vehicles that frequent our garage, and the one I heard was NOT my roommate's. It was the girlfriend's. I knew that I needed to move fast. I needed to get upstairs and out of sight, but I had been sleeping so hard that it was difficult for me to find the motivation. I stretched and yawned, and that exercise gave me a huge head rush. I had to wait a moment to regain my equilibrium. Finally, I was able to hop off the couch. I headed to the stairs, and I was about to ascend when, BOOM!! The back door swung open as if it had been blown off its hinges by a violent wind. Startled, I quickly turned around and I was face to face with . . . the little curly headed girl!!!!

She screamed at a decibel level so high that the dumb dogs in the back yard started to bark and howl. I spun around and ran as fast as I could up the stairs. Once upstairs, I had to think quick: which room should I go to? Immediately, I decided that the kitchen was the best bet. I mean heck, the girl had been gone from home for almost a week, so logically I believed that she would go into her room first to see her toys or something. Boy was I wrong! Into the kitchen she burst, screaming my name with a banshee-like force that was terrifying and yet at the same time, joyous and giddy. I tried to head out of the back door of the kitchen into the taller pretty girl's room, but I wasn't fast enough.

As the air was explosively and violently expelled from my lungs from the full weight of the little curly haired girl crashing down on top of me, through a pain soaked haze, I saw the tall kid open the door to the balcony. I knew that if I could wriggle free, if for only a second or two, I could get outside. Fortunately for me, the little curly haired girl still had the cold she had before she went on vacation. So when she stopped assaulting me for a brief moment to wipe her nose on me, I made my move. In a flash, I was outside on the balcony overlooking the goofy dogs. The door closed very quietly behind me, which through hindsight, was the most ironic part of my day.

I could hear the little curly haired girl hollering inside behind the closed storm door. I turned and looked back through the glass just to make sure she wasn't following me. I was safe; she was trapped inside. I took a deep breath and headed down the back stairs of the balcony to take a walk and to gather myself. One moment I was asleep, and the next moment I am being viciously attacked by a raving, lunatic, two year old with a runny nose.

When my roommate came home, he asked me if I wanted to come inside with him.

I went for another walk. The vacation is over.