About halfway through my 12 days of flu, nocturnal scratchings of small rodent co-residents reached a crescendo. Of course, right? For several nights a dose of codeine had got me some desperately needed relief from my racking cough. But then there I was awake, listenining to what sounded like gentle sawing, at 3 AM.
Clarence was awake too, and pacing. Down we went to meet whatever intruder we might find. Living alone, and having been a single parent all those years– at one point living one metro stop from Pigalle– you not only stop sleeping deeply but you are ready for anything, at any hour. More stories on that, later.
My sleepy fluey codeine-dosed head was trying to focus, to solve the noise. It was unlike the mouse noises I’ve become all too accustomed to, the scratching and rapid running. This was really a rrr, rrr; rrr, rrr, like a mini saw on a mini board.
When we hit the fourth stair from the bottom, something caught my eye. In the riser of that stair is a lovely iron grate, vestige of an air vent of some kind, left for decorative purpose.
Well, sticking out of the grate appeared to be a stick with white flecks. Oh, a snow-flecked stick! my drug-addled mind achieved. I bent down to take a look.
Not a snow-flecked stick, no, was a reindeer with white royal icing piped on it. I knew well because I’d made these, as I have for over 20 years, since my son was a baby. We always hang some on the tree. High up, as my own non-rodent animals (historically cat and dogs) are apt to pull them off and eat them. Very gently, as I would find the ribbon loops untorn, unscathed in any way on the floor, not a single crumb. Very tidy.
Now the gingerbread is sticking out of the grate as I can plainly see, but still I am not quite getting it. Why is there a cookie there? A few steps down and I look into the living room, to the 7-foot tree, to the gingerbread hanging at the top– oops. Where there had been a 1/2 dozen stars and flying reindeer there are now empty red ribbon loops. Not even loops– it looked like they’d been cut; the knot remained up top, the opening below, where the gingerbread was removed. By mice! I surmise. Carried down the trunk, over six feet, across the moat of the tree water, ten feet to the stairs, up four stairs to the vent. I imagined a group of them carrying gingerbread on their mice shoulders.
The cookie that was stuck there, Pooh-like, was about 5″ long and 3″ tall. It had Clare written on it, the ribbon loop still intact. The last remaining gingerbread from the tree; Nocci’s and the others were gone. Had I been in a different state I might have given this one to the mice, just for their incredible effort. But I pulled it out and tossed it. The fastest, quietest route back to bed was all I cared about right then.
One for the (sick) human. And time for traps.