Bumps in the night

As a favor to my mom, G and I spent the night at her apartment for a night while she was out of town.  Mom’s place is not the typical apartment because she lives in an industrialized zone as the manager/caretaker of a self-storage business.  She has no neighbors and is surrounded by compartments that house other people’s stuff.  Part of our helping out my mom was the setting of an alarm system that protects the precious belongings entrusted to this establishment.

Earlier in the day my mom showed me how to both set and disarm the system.  You know that the alarm has been set when the “Armed” light turns on and you can hear one loud whoop resound outside.  The system is disarmed when the “Armed” light is no longer displayed and the confirmation sound is two short relatively soft beeps.

(2:30AM) G and I are asleep in the guest bedroom and through my groggy consciousness I hear G asking me if I heard the alarm.  I don’t know, perhaps, but more importantly maybe I’ll just roll over and fall back asleep.  Out of the quiet comes this loud rumbling noise (think herd of cattle) storming up the stairs. G yells and I run to the bedroom door and brace it, expectant of the onslaught.  I tell her to pick up the phone and dial the Emergency number (911).

I scream , “Who is it?”

“Dan.” (Dan!?!) “Your brother.”

“My brother?”

At this point I am slowly opening up the door to find my youngest brother Danny standing at the end of the hallway.  He is staring in bewilderment and my heart is racing with the adrenaline to fight off hoards of would be attackers.  G explains the mix-up to the phone operator and immedietly starts laughing with abandon.  I am a mess–wondering why my brother would barge into the apartment in the middle of the night while G starts to mimic my brave chivalrous movements of protecting her from harm.  What’s there to do but laugh?

My brother at least as disturbed to find us heads for the exit before I can speak to him.  I look out the window and he’s already in his car backing up.  G can barely catch her breath and I’m left fully awake in the middle of the night lying beside this shaking creature who sensing my seriousness is trying to still her quaking heart. 

My fear has been revealed and poof like that it dissipates and forms anew as silly relief.