It's About Squirrels...

... It's worse than weird, Sara. Ever since I replaced the hard drive, I've been surrounded by obsessed squirrels. No kidding. They're all over this place. I've got a neighbor who's trapping them and carting them away by the dozens. He thinks I'm feeding them. I'm not, of course; I'm too busy sending out resumes to be feeding squirrels. He's got to think I'm a slug, not that I've seen a slug around here, but every time he knocks on the door, I'm just waking up. I didn't sleep well last night. I dreamed there was someone in the trailer with me—a woman all dressed in glowing, silvery gray. In my dream—I'm telling myself it had to be a dream—the fairy woman was trying to steal the dead hard drive because there was a brownie trapped on it because squirrels had chased it into a transformer.

My dream made sense, but nothing makes sense now, except that I'm losing it...

fast.

Nic checked her e-mail throughout the evening. She picked up the phone more than once, but her per-minute long-distance rate was too high for commiseration, even on a night when she found herself more depressed than she'd been when she'd first lost her job. When midnight came and went without communication from the civilized world, Nic shuffled into the kitchen, ready to wolf down some unhealthy snack on her way to bed. Her hand was inches away from a box of generic cookies when she spotted a can of evaporated milk she didn't remember purchasing.

A bowl of milk, Bobby Walker had said: bread soaking in a bowl of milk for brownies, luck, and a clean kitchen. The formula hadn't worked for Mrs.

Walker, but Nic was willing to give it a try. She shredded slices of bread into a milk-filled cereal bowl. Then, because she couldn't feel any more foolish, Nic set the bowl beside the dead hard drive.

It was still there, lumpy, scummy, and utterly unappetizing, when she awoke hours later. So were the squirrels, both in the woven-wire traps and racing free around the trailer. They'd grown destructive overnight. Several of the rodents squatted on the car's hood, stripping away her windshield wipers as though the black rubber were licorice candy. Nic slapped the picture window in a futile attempt to scatter them.

The sound snared the attention of a squirrel perched on the narrow banister beside the door. It launched itself at the window and hung there a moment before sliding down. Another squirrel hit the window hard enough to make Nic jump away with surprise. This second squirrel, more determined than the first, fought the pull of gravity. Its dark claws squealed frantically against the glass before it, too, fell from sight.

When a third squirrel leaped from an overhead branch, Nic had had enough. Grabbing a dish towel, she burst out the door, flailing cloth and shouting. The squirrels scattered, but not far. When Nic turned around, one of them was at the top of the steps, scratching at the door which was closed, but not completely shut. She whirled the towel above her head and charged.

"Whoa!"

The voice came out of nowhere, along with an opposite pull on the towel.

Nic let go of the cloth. She spun around and found herself perilously close to Bobby Walker.

"One more step, and you'd have landed on the ones we already caught."

Nic looked down at the writhing trap inches from her foot. She didn't know what to say, but was spared the need for words when a squirrel flung itself at the window.

Bobby Walker whistled his astonishment. "Never seen a squirrel do that before."

"They're pallbearer squirrels."

"Didn't you say that had something to do with transformers and blowing out your computer?"

She nodded.

"But these fellows are jumping at your windows."

Nic nodded again. "I lost a hard drive when the transformer first blew. It's sitting out on the table by the window. They've spotted it and are trying to getto it."

There was a squirrel—maybe the same squirrel, maybe a different one—scratching at the front door. Bobby clapped his hands. It scampered a few yards, then sat up on its haunches, twitching its tail and poised for another leap at the door.

"Is that something squirrels do?" he asked. "Doesn't seem right to me. It's not like there's anything for them to eat in a computer."

Nic took a breath before explaining. "There's something on the hard drive—something that got trapped there when the hard drive failed. Now, instead of just a few squirrels stuck in a rut, it's attracting more and more of them."

Bobby Walker opened his mouth, but shut it without saying a word as another squirrel leaped at the window. The glass shuddered in sunlight.

"Maybe you should hide that hard drive where the squirrels can't see it. Too bad it's attracting squirrels. If it was turkeys or deer you'd really have something going during hunting season—"

Nic's imagination took a Hitchcockian turn as she imagined Thanksgiving-sized birds hurling themselves at the trailer.

"Or you could just bring it out here and give the little beggars what they want. I'd like to see what they'd do with a worthless hard drive."

"It's broken, not worthless. If I don't get it back to the manufacturer, I've got to pay for the new one."

"Then take it to the post office. Let them worry about the damned squirrels."

Nic sighed and told Bobby Walker about the disappearing man she'd encountered on her way to the post office.

"Just some crazy old man—"

She told him about the luminous woman with silver tears.

"A dream—"

"Not a dream," Nic insisted. "I wished it were a dream. I even tried to wish myself awake, but I wasn't asleep to begin with." She saw disbelief in Bobby Walker's eyes. "You must think I'm the one who's crazy."

"Not crazy. Someone who doesn't want to be here and would give anything to be anywhere else. It's too bad—"

Before Bobby could share the rest of his insight, they were both startled by two squirrels striking the window in quick succession.

"I better hide that hard drive."

Nic bounded up the stairs and didn't object when Bobby Walker followed her. The hard drive was in plain sight on the table. So was the bowl of milk-soaked bread. Nic grabbed it first, but not quickly enough.

"There's where you've made your mistake," he said flatly.

"Where?"

"Well, ma'am—I told you, bread in a bowl of milk won't work. That's for Scottish brownies. What we've got around here are suth'run brownies. You want to catch a suth'run brownie, ma'am, you've got to set out beer and a dish of pork rinds, or some of those little hot dogs in a can—"

Nic froze.

"That was a joke," Bobby Walker insisted. "You've got to laugh at yourself, Nicole Larsens, or whatever's eating at you is go

"I don't belong here."

"Nobody belongs here." He opened his arms to include the whole trailer park. "We're just passing through on our way up, or down."

"Which way do you think I'm going?"

"Can't tell yet."

"And you?"

"Can't tell that either. Up, I hope."

Nic offered to make coffee and washed the incriminating evidence out of the cereal bowl while the elixir filtered into the pot. She returned the hard drive to its antistatic pouch and stuffed the pouch into the cardboard box which, after a moment's thought, she put in the oven.

"It doesn't work," she explained. "And it's so dirty, I wouldn't use it, even if it did."

"Why not just take the box to the post office?"

"Because today's Saturday and the post office isn't open at this hour on Saturdays; and, besides, I'm going to try the beer thing."

"Do you believe in Santa Claus and the Easter Bu

Sarcasm sounded different with a mid-Florida drawl, but no less biting when wielded by an obvious expert. Nic had underestimated Bobby Walker and his bright-red pickup.

"There are squirrels knocking themselves silly against my window—"