My daughter mentioned it after spending the night in our guest room.
She heard strange sounds that scared her, like Alligator Lizards hissing in the middle of the night…right outside the bedroom window.

I guess I dismissed it and didn’t think about it again until my cousin was visiting for a week.
We talked about it one morning after I asked how she was sleeping. 

“I guarantee you something’s outside that window in the middle of the night!” I loved her mixed Missouri-Virginia accent.
“I’ve heard it more than once…hissing. I’d love to take a look but I’m too afraid I’ll come eye to eye with some weird thing that only comes out at night.”

I remembered my daughter had said the exact same thing even used the same word… hissing.



OK, time to take this seriously and give it some thought.
What could it be?
I was almost too scared to think about it myself. 


What was hiding?
Maybe burrowed in the retaining-wall rocks all day?
Waiting for dark to lurk about my yard, walk around the patio, drink from the dogs water bowl, maybe even take a dip in the pond? 


Did it watch us during the day?



Another daughter had spotted a Bobcat the week before just down the street. She’d come racing into the house, looked up Bobcat on the computer and then said, “Yep, that’s what I saw, about 6 houses down from here.”


Was a Bobcat coming into the yard each night and hissing at something?
I guess Bobcats hiss, house cats do.

Or….. was it that horrid, 3-foot (seemed like 10-feet) long, yellow snake that 2 weeks earlier had ever so slowly passed through my back-yard?
(THIS, my reader friends is FOR SURE another story!)
Snakes hiss, the big yellow one didn’t but I’m sure all the rest of them do.



I guess the only way to find out would be to sleep in the guest room with a flashlight …and a weapon!
Nothing I wanted to do but maybe my knight in shining armor would like a crack at being the hero and slaying the dragon.



He agreed, so that night we kissed good-night and he walked bravely into the spare bedroom, flashlight in hand.



I stayed in our room, convinced both dogs to join me and covered my head with the sheet.
I was sure my hero would figure this out.



But, then I began to worry.
What if the hissing monster saw him peering and grabbed him right through the screen?
What if he couldn’t yell for help?


I needed to be there and if I was going, so were my 2 furry companions.



We hurried out of one room and into the other… two dogs, me and a can of pepper spray!

When we crawled in beside him, my knight was happy but kinda not surprised.



We each found our little spot on the futon (mine being furthest from the window.) 

I wanted to be there to help, sure… but I didn’t want to be taken like King Kong took Anne from the ship and into the jungle.



Eventually we all fell into sleep.


Two loud barks in the middle of the night had my hero jumping from the futon, on to his feet and ready for combat.



At that very moment, I decided to wait under the sheet with my thumb ready in pepper-spray position, until he yelled for help.
(Possibly had Anne hid under the sheets with pepper spray, King Kong wouldn’t have found her!) 


One of my eyes (the bravest one) decided to peek out from the sheet and observe him in action.
He saw me looking and quickly ducked under the window.


“I saw them! There’s more than one,” he whispered.
My heart skipped 27 beats! 


He lifted his head slowly ‘til he was eye level with the window and I went back undercover.


“They’re out there, they’re all over the yard…..DON’T MOVE.”


Oh my God…..for sure I wasn’t moving… I was only barely breathing!


“I’m coming under the covers with you. We need to make a plan.”


Oh my God, a plan?
The only plan I was makin’ was to boogie outta that room, PRONTO!


He wrapped his arms around me and whispered near my ear. 


“We can handle this two ways” 


“We?” Oh my God! NO, not “we.”
I was there simply for support, nothing more!


“I can go out in the garage,” he continued.


NO! I can’t let him go out there alone and that’s what he’d be….. ALONE.
I was NOT going to the garage. 

“……………………and change the timer OR, we can go back to our bed in our room and let the “hissing” sprinklers do their job and water the outside…..WHILE WE SLEEP!”



Now, that could have been the end of it, right there but…..he laughed….real hard.
He shouldn’t have done that!


The end was when I slugged him in the arm…..and then we BOTH laughed, even harder. 


THAT was the end.