Check Under the Bed

Last night when I turned on the light in our bedroom, I saw one leg peeking out from under the bed. One black shoe, one denim pant leg… They looked like LT Fromage’s clothes, but he was following behind me. This could only mean one of two things: there was a dead man’s body shoved under the bed, or there was a live man’s body under the bed, but either way it couldn’t be good.

What it turned out to be was no body under the bed, just the evidence of a messy LT Fromage who had dropped his clothes on the floor before taking a nap. Phew! We had a good laugh about it and later, I tried to hide and replicate the scene and scare LT Fromage; however he could see that I was up to something, suspected my sneaky plan and wasn’t shocked.

It made us remember another time I thought someone was under the bed.

When LT Fromage was in Georgia for a few months he stayed in barracks type housing, so when I flew out for a visit, we booked a hotel. I don’t remember which one we stayed at, but it was a reputable chain so we were both a little put off when we arrived only to find it was, well, not what we were used to. I seem to remember LT Fromage debating returning to his room to bring back his gun for the weekend…

The first night we were there I woke up in the wee hours of the morning needing a diet soda. As I lied there in the dark debating whether I should get up, get dressed, dig out a dollar in change, venture outside and down the stairs to the soda machine, which happened to have only Coke products (gag!), or try and wait the craving out (Ultimately, I did go get the soda. My will power is not that strong) I listened to LT Fromage breathing. We had been doing the long distance thing for a year by then and it was so nice to wake up and hear him next to me. I started to drift back to sleep thinking of what a wonderful life it was, resting next to the man I loved, my dog sleeping next to the bed… Wait? What?

I didn’t bring the dog. 70 pound Satchel did not fly to Georgia with me. Who else was breathing in that room? Unless someone was under the bed.

I pushed lightly on LT Fromage, “wake up… hey…. Wake up!” When he rolled over, eyes barley open, I whispered (very quietly, I didn’t want to let on to the man-under-the-bed that I knew he was there!) “Will you look under the bed?”

LT Fromage was confused. “Why? What’s under the bed?”

If someone was hiding under that bed, I didn’t want them to know that I knew they were there! We needed the element of surprise so I didn’t mention the suspected man-under-the-bed, “Just look! Please!”

LT Fromage rolled over and peeked under the bed. Nothing. “What was that about?” he asked again.

I breathed a sigh of relief and told him I thought I heard someone breathing under there (it must have been a withdrawal symptom from my lack of carbonated beverages). Assured that we were safe, I was ready to go back to sleep, but LT Fromage sat straight up and asked a fair question:

“Wait a minute! You thought someone was under the bed, and you sent me to look without so much as a warning! I was groggy and had no idea what I was getting into! What good was that going to do us?”

I guess when you look at it that way…

So last night, when I saw the leg, I made sure to announce why I needed LT Fromage to hurry in, “Because I’m pretty sure there’s a dead man under the bed!”