Jimi Hendrix Pest Control Company
by
Steve Dodge
SMASHWORDS EDITION
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Copyright © 2011 by Steve Dodge
All rights reserved. No part of this story may be reproduced or transmitted in any form without permission from the author.
Dedicated to the work and memory of Jimi Hendrix, born on Nov. 27, 1942. Cover image copyright 2011 by Cafe Wha? Emily Smalley, artist, Greenwich Village, New York, NY. Cafewha.com. Used by permission.
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Jimi Hendrix Pest Control Company
Rain pounded the roof as the wind ravaged the trees and blew sheets of water against the siding, whistling and rattling at the window near my bed. Tired as I was, the noise made it impossible to make a connection with the Sandman.
Finally, the wind died down and the rain ceased. I began to slip away on cottony paths of unconsciousness. At precisely that moment the noise began. In the attic above my head, something bumped: THUMP! THUMP! THUMP! The sound seemed so deliberate, paced the way it was, that it had to be human. Groggy from the half sleep, I weighed the possibilities. "Could someone be up there?" my mind raged. At about the same time, the memory of peeking in the attic door a few days earlier came to me. I had been curious so had gotten a chair and pushed the door open to reveal darkness and cobwebs and a space too small for a human except to crawl through. Still, I wondered, had some weirdo gotten up there while I was gone? Had I disturbed some sleeping thing that was now going to eat me monster-movie style?