Going Batty

Last night I had one of the scariest experiences of my life. It didn’t involve Moose at all, he was sound asleep in his crib. It was just me, and the wild outdoors that decided to invade my house and attack me.
I’ll set the scene first.
Cory had run up to Richmond with our friend Steve to look at a truck that he wanted to buy. They had left right after work. Cory promised he’d be home early that evening, hopefully around 9 or so.
Moose and I had a nice evening at first. I gave him dinner, and a bath, and then he went to bed.
I was sitting on the couch, wearing a purple negligee, watching a show on vampires on the History channel, when I saw something flash by. I glanced up, and looked straight into the beady little eyes of a big huge bat.
The scream that came out of my mouth rivaled that of Janet Leigh in Psycho.
I sat straight up and grabbed the throw pillow I had been laying on, and tried to hit it in the air. I didn’t even come close.
At that point, it was flying in a loose circle from the living room, to the dining room, and through the kitchen, then back to me in the living room, where I unsuccessfully tried to hit it with the pillow.
My heart was in my ears, as sweat started to bead on my skin. I jumped up to get a better angle with the pillow. Every time it came at me, I screamed and tried to hit it with the pillow.
Finally after a few minutes of bombardment, it swooped down the hall.
I had a few moments to try and decide what the hell I was going to do, when it came flying back down the hallway. Straight at me.
More screaming and pillow swinging.
Finally I realized I had to get to my phone. Luckily the bat decided to head into the foyer. I raced through to the kitchen, and bounded back to the living room, where I had the best vantage point. I made mental note that Moose was probably the safest place he could be, closed up in his bedroom.
I dialed Cory’s number and waited for him to answer.
Cory: Hello?
Me: OHMYGODKGJIRHTJBNSDJFHSAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!
Cory: What? Honey, are you okay?
Me: (breathing hard, trying to catch my breath, and force my mouth to work) Bat. There’s a bat in the house.
Cory: In the house?
Me: YES IN THE HOUSE. WHERE ARE YOU?!!
Cory: (calmly) On my way home, I’m almost there.
Me: *expletive* get home now!
Cory: Okay, I’m about 30 minutes away.
Me: OKAY BYE, IT’S BACK.
Cory: Hit it with a frying pan.
Me: eh?
Cory: Kill it with a frying pan.
Me: OKAY BYE.

In my opinion, a frying pan was still way too close to my hand. I needed something longer that I could swing at it.
A broom!
Yes, a broom. Now I just had to go down the long dark hallway that the bat had just disappeared down, to my broom closet.
Shit.
I slowly made my way down the hallway and opened the door. I managed to get out the broom and close it as quickly, and softly as I ever have.
Then I stalked back to the living room to wait for the next attack.
All of the things that are going through your head right now that I should do? Shut up. You weren’t there. At that point I was totally in shock, and running on pure adrenaline. My heart was in my ears, my skin was slick with sweat, my hands were locked around the broom. (remember I’m wearing the purple negligee too right?)
I locked my legs into a battle stance and held the broom across my front, and waited for it to fly down the hallway again.
I didn’t have to wait long.
It swooped through the hallway, and headed directly for me. I swung the broom for a direct hit. And hit nothing but air. I tried several times before I realized there was no way I was going to hit it. But I was scaring it to death, I was pretty sure.
We went though this two more times, where it would hide in the hallway, and head back at me where I would unsuccessfully try to whack it with the broom.
After the second time, I realized I had to do something else, this wasn’t working. And plus, if I had to do it anymore, I was probably going to have a stroke, because I could barely catch my breath each time.
So I called my friend who lives down the street to see if her husband can come help me. Nope. I forgot he was out of town. Shit. She did have some good advice though, “go hide in the bedroom”.
That meant I had to go down the hallway. Where the bat was.
I would have to chance it. I started down the hallway, just as it started from the other side.
I turned and ran the other way. No heroics here.
As I turned around when I got back to the living room, I turned to see it swoop down into the foyer and land on the coat rack.
This was my chance.
I turned and made a break for it. I made it to the bedroom pretty easily. I closed both doors and stood in battle stance, watching for a shadow under the door. I thought I could probably see it if it flew back down the hallway. I didn’t see it again.
I stood there for 20 minutes, waiting for Cory to come home. My arms locked, my feet apart, with my heart in my ears. Broom in hand.
It was so great to hear the front door open, and to have Cory and Steve walk in. I hastily added some pajama bottoms to my negligee, and met them out in the foyer. They were extremely annoyed that I didn’t know where it was, and that I had hid in the bedroom. They looked through everything, shaking this and that, lifting up curtains and such.
Nothing.
At this point they had opened the front door, and I could have kicked myself for not thinking of that. It never even occurred to me.
They searched the entire first floor of the house, and found nothing. I stood at the top of the foyer, and watched for it to fly out of the front door. No such luck.
Cory was down in the basement when he heard a flutter. He looked behind the recliner, and one of the sticky bug traps we had put down had trapped the bat. There must have been a cricket or something stuck to it, because the bat had managed to get its face and one of its wings trapped to the sticky stuff.
Cory took it out back and took care of it.
Even though it was dead, it was really hard for me to key down. I was still in battle stance, with an unrelenting grip on my broom when they came upstairs.
Cory said that it was, indeed a pretty “good sized bat”. The body was about the size of my fist, and the wing span was about nine inches. HUGE AND SCARY.
Last week we had Terminix come to spray for crickets. The lady said that there were bats in our attic, even though we had had some people come for that already. Cory called the bat people back and had them come back. They closed up a little hole that they had missed, and said that the bats in the attic would starve to death in a few days, and since their bodies were 80% water, they would then turn to dust.
Apparently one of the trapped bats from the attic made a last ditch effort of escaping by squeezing through the attic trap door, in the hallway. Their bodies don’t have bone, only cartilage, so they can squeeze through a crack the size of a width of a quarter.
I’m still not over it. I had scary flash backs this morning when I glance down the hall, and I can’t walk through the hall without cringing under the attic trap door.