Gigantic Flying Cockroach!

 Noah is 11 years-old and he exaggerates everything. I don’t know whom he gets it from.

“MOM!” Noah screamed, in capital letters, “There’s a gigantic flying cockroach in my room.” He had his phone to his ear and I saw this because he wasn’t using his phone to call me. He was calling his father who was at work. I have my bed to my ear because it was 11:15 p.m.

I flipped my covers off, the way angry drivers flip off other drivers, and say, “Who are you calling, it’s 11:15 p.m.” I say this because I don’t want to even think about a gigantic flying cockroach and it is 11:15 p.m.

In his bedroom I asked him the obvious questions. “Where is it?” and “Why are you calling Dad?” “It’s behind the blinds, and Dad told me to get you up.”

I wrestled with this dilemma for what seemed like the longest two seconds. I couldn’t fathom how to handle the problem (and I also had the gigantic flying cockroach to deal with). Why would my husband want me to get up? I hate bugs.

I quickly moved on to the real issue I was facing, that of the gigantic flying cockroach. I would deal with my husband later.

At this point, Christian, who doesn’t exaggerate everything, appeared in the doorway with his Air-Soft BB gun. He maneuvered across the floor, Rambo style, wiped the sweat from his brow, smearing the camouflage face paint and asked the obvious question, “Where’s Dad?”

The gigantic flying cockroach, which I will now refer to as the GFC because everyone loves acronyms and my fingers are getting tired, had oozed from between the slats of the blinds and had situated itself on the ceiling. Christian pointed the gun at the GFC and said something like, “Freeze, or I’ll shoot.” I don’t know because I was distracted by pooping my pants and screaming, in gigantic capital letters, the very thing I was doing in my pants.

I won’t tell you that Christian shot the GFC and blew its wings off. I will only say that the GFC did not ‘freeze’ as instructed.

The next night, and I know story wise, this is a big leap in time (but by now it was about 4:15 a.m.), I tucked the exaggerator into bed. At 11:15, and I am not kidding, Noah is screaming – again – that there is another “GIGANTIC FLYING COCKROACH in his room.”

I know word count is important to writers but I wont bore you with repeating this story in its entirety. However, I will tell you it wasn’t actually ‘another’ GFC. It was the same one. I know this because it made ‘angry-driver hand gestures’ at me. It also had no wings.

This time, Christian didn’t shoot its wings off. He stabbed it with a Rambo-style Nerf sword.

Disclaimer: I do not condone violence. I am appalled by shootings and stabbings UNLESS they involve gigantic flying cockroaches.