El visitante

Last year about this time, I was sitting on the bed nursing Winnie, who was just a few weeks old, when a mouse darted out from under our bed, twitched its whiskers, scurried about the room, and squeezed under the bedroom door to run out into the hall. To say I was disconcerted would be a huge understatement. My heart was pounding, I was flooded with adrenaline, and I called Jared and left a panicky voicemail on his cell phone. We set a few traps and inspected the house for possible points of entry, but we didn’t catch the mouse or turn up any obvious way it could have gotten in. In the meantime, I continued to have mouse sightings every day or so. It got to the point where I really resented being home (I was on maternity leave at the time) because I was on constant mouse high-alert. There’s something about the unexpected sight of a mouse that for me causes an involuntary, fight-or-flight reaction. It’s hugely stressful, and in some ways is even worse when I half-expect to see one, because I jump at every shadow.

 

As the days went by, I started to worry about mice multiplying somewhere in the house. Maybe it wasn’t just one mouse I was seeing, but various members of a large mouse family. Maybe it was a single pregnant female. Ugh. I had a hard time having people over. I was worried my visiting teachers would be in the middle of their lesson and the mouse would dart out from under the couch. I cleaned the kitchen obsessively. I made Jared help me clean out a storage shed attached to the house, going through each and every box and inspecting the area for any signs it harbored mice. Anyway, after about a week of tears, cleaning, and research into trap-setting (who knew mouse traps should be set in a certain orientation with respect to the walls?) that mouse met an untimely end and was properly disposed of.  To my huge relief, it was in fact a loner. We never saw another one.

 

Until today. As I was getting ready for work in the dim light and wee hours of the early morning, I thought I saw a fleeting movement out the corner of my eye. I had that instant heart-pounding, panicky feeling, but I talked myself down, thinking it was probably my imagination. Au contraire. A few minutes later as I emerged from the bathroom, still vulnerably barefoot, I distinctly saw a mouse peek its face under the hallway door and then dart back into the corner where I originally saw it. This is SO annoying. I’m pretty sure I know how this one got in. And I’m prepared to bring the full arsenal to make sure it’s gone. This is war.