Ungodly hour encounter....

As I munched on my biscuits at 4 am, not particularly my favorite snack but nothing seemed good enough in the fridge. Various sitcoms downloaded from the net kept me on my seat rather than mope. I felt the sudden urge to abandon Jerry Seinfeld and his gang after about twenty minutes and decide to head out.

At 4 am things are rather quiet outside, a perfect time to be alone with my thoughts.

The sound of a stone hitting my window wakes me up from my new found euphoria. Startled I open the window to see my buddy, Nick, sneer and yell at me to come down.

"Drat", I said. What could Nick possibly want at this ungodly hour?

Nick was my best friend, and slightly retarded too. He came up with weird ideas at weird times. This time he had something on the same wavelength. Putting on a warmer shirt I stepped out to the cold, drafty night.

"I've got a plan that will blow the bonkers out of Mr. Barnaby" cooed Nick.

"What now Nick, what do you have in your convoluted mind?" I responded.

"Something that will be the icing on the cake, something that we've always wanted to do, something that will teach Mr. Barnaby never to mess with us, something......."

"NICK", I cut in. "Just tell me what is it that you've got in your head, spill it out will you?"

Nick ignored my impatience and said 'We are going to kidnap his pet parakeet'. Apparently Mr. Barnaby adored his pet and it was his only companion.

Mr. Barnaby was our Biology professor and he always favored the bright kids. We were just mediocre according to him. He had no kids himself, no wife and no family he could call his own.

"Nick you've gotta be kidding me, how on earth can we break into his house, let alone kidnap his bird?”

'I've got it all planned, we sneak into his backyard and enter through the back door. I have a pin which will help us disengage that old rickety door of his'.

'You're outta your goddamn mind Nick, you can never get me to go with you'.

'Well, then', said Nick, 'Stay here and be further humiliated by him. Remember when he scolded you for not dissecting that frog and the countless times when he has scolded you for no apparent reason. It's been two long years man, two goddamn years!’

He did have a point, I always loathed Mr. Barnaby, and he was a royal pain in the...

"Dude", Nick interrupted. "You in?”

I don't know what, but I said yes.

The next thing I know is we were approaching Mr. Barnaby's lawn and climbing over the wooden fence.

"Careful now, we don't want the spiteful old man to wake up and find us jaywalking on his backyard" whispered Nick.

"Just hurry up, man, I'm dying with fear here", I confessed.

We reached the backdoor. Nick wasn't kidding when he said that the back door was old. I could probably have knocked it down with a kick, but we decided to use our little pin instead.

"Creaaakkkkk" the door screamed. We held our breath as we entered Mr. Barnaby's house. The backdoor took us to a small kitchen. We tiptoed our way further into the house. Small torches kept us aware of that lay ahead of us. Beads of sweat were now streaming rapidly down my face. I felt the urge to tell Nick that I'd had enough, but we were too far into our plan to back out now.

"Where is that blasted bird?” said Nick loudly almost forgetting that this was supposed to be a secret plan.

"Shut up you spaz", I blurted in a whispering tone. "Let's just get on with it, shall we".

We entered another room which led us to what we believed was Mr. Barnaby's bedroom. Then, we saw the victim of our plan. The bird was sleeping in its cage. We knew we had to get it out of the house with pin drop silence. Nick proceeded to carefully pick the cage up. The bird, to our relief was still asleep.

The beads of sweat were now evaporating, the feeling of all is well was finally there. All we had to do now was to take the bird outside the house. Almost like a flash we heard the sound of a door opening. I and Nick stood still with fear.

Suddenly I heard myself screaming to Nick. "Run Nick, Run. It's Barnaby!”

We ran out, with the bird in hand. I was going to kill Nick. Apparently what Nick forgot to tell me was Mr. Barnaby used to go for late night strolls around his neighborhood twice a week and Nick thought that this night was when he could plan the break in.

We reached an old outhouse and decided to shack up there. We could hear the sound of someone following us all along. All of a sudden a dark silhouette appeared. And it appeared to be nearing us. We hid behind an old patio table. The bird which we had forgotten about was now cawing.

"Nick, do something. The bird will give us away".

Nick took out a Swiss army knife and silenced the bird. I swallowed hard trying not to think what Nick did. The sudden silence scared me beyond my wits. Then in a clear tone I heard Mr. Barnaby yell out our names. We were caught. Grabbing Nick's hand I pulled him up and ran. We ran for what seemed like ages until I reached my house.

Nick split from there and I hurriedly ran to my room, the sound of our stalker's footsteps still echoing in my ears. What I thought was mentally happening appeared to be happening now in real life. Someone was approaching me and shouting my name.

"Andy, Andy” wake up. You have to go to school, come on now, no more excuses. You have a long day ahead".

It was Mom and her voice seemed heavenly. Ah it was all a dream.

I was going to kill Nick anyways. He was very capable of such ideas.

"Two minutes, mom!" I said sleepily. I snuggled under my warm blanket. All is well I whispered to myself.

A sharp feeling jabbed my leg as I turned over to my side. It was a penknife and it was bloody.

This really was going to be a long day….