IMAGINARY FRIENDS - Page 40

Jeff ignored his mother, and chose to wax nostalgic. “Ah, tighty whities,” he said to Elise. “No Christmas would be complete without them.”

Elise looked at him funny. “What are you talking about?”

“Every Christmas, I got a package of six tighty whities. Every day after Christmas, me and the neighborhood kids would use them as slings for throwing snowballs. We’d put them on snowmen we made and…”

Something caught Jeff’s eye. On the far end of the room, under a hundred discarded present wrappings, there was a rustling. A movement.

“And what?” Elise prodded.

The rustling became more pronounced now – more like burrowing. A little hump moved to and fro in the tatters of colored wrapping.

“Do you see that?!” Jeff pointed.

“What?”

Wrapping paper started to churn as the thing sped up.

“That!”

“What?!”

Now paper flew in the air as the thing (whatever it was) weaved a drunken course across the room!

“I don’t know, maybe a – ”

Jeff stared in disbelief as the thing suddenly straightened its course – and headed right for Davey.

“ – RAT? DAVEY, WATCH OUT!”

Jeff leapt from the couch.

“A RAT?!” Grandmother Tanner screamed, and scrambled up onto her chair.

“A rat?” Davey asked excitedly, glancing all around. “Cool, can I keep it for a –”

A shadow fell across him, and he cut his question short. He looked up to see Jeff soaring above him, face in a panic, arms outstretched, a pajama’d superman in a slo-mo arc through the air.

Then he hit the floor.

WHAM! Jeff made contact just behind Davey, and cut through the wrapping paper like a hall-of-famer sliding for home. Within seconds he was on his feet, tearing through the paper, tossing colored scraps like a three year-old in a leaf pile.

“It’s here!” he shouted. “I saw it! It was moving in the paper, it was making a bee-line right for Davey – ”

Suddenly Jeff slipped. BOOM! Everyone in the room jumped as he began to thrash about and scream!

“AAAAAHHHHHH! IT’S IN MY ROBE! OH MY GOD, IT’S IN MY ROBE, IT’S – ”

Jeff jumped to his feet and tore off his robe. Then his pajama top. Then his pajama bottoms. He jumped up and down on the pile of clothes, trying to pulverize his attacker.

“IT’S IN THERE, IT WAS TRYING TO GET ME – ”

He yanked up the clothes and felt through them, patting them down, shaking them out.

“IT’S…it’s…not there…”

Jeff stopped and looked up at everyone staring at him in shock (except for Elise, who hid a delighted smile beneath one hand).

About then he realized he was half-naked, standing in the middle of a room filled with old folks and children, wearing only a pair of polka-dot boxers.

“Get butt-nekkid, Dad!” Davey shouted.

“Jeffrey Tanner, don’t you dare!” Grandmother Tanner warned.

“Boy, put your clothes on right now!” Grandfather Tanner said.

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Copyright © 2008 Darren Pillsbury. All rights reserved.