There was a cockroach in my bathroom.
With a clacking flutter of wings, it darted up my wall as I was finishing washing my face.
I screamed, ran out, and shut the door.
“There’s a cockroach in there!” I told Sean. He just looked at me. “Ew!” I said. But he didn’t move.
I went back to the bedroom and put some pants on (pantsless computing is my thing), and then I put socks and sneakers on because shoes without socks is too naked, and then I crept back out to the main living area and cautiously approached the bathroom door.
Sean was still sitting at his computer. He hadn’t moved. I looked at him, then moved the rug in front of the utility closet with my foot, wondering morbidly if there was an army of cockroaches in that closet. I looked back at Sean. He looked at me.
He obviously wasn’t going to do anything, so I opened the door.
The cockroach was nowhere in sight.
“Where did it go?” I simpered. Sean still didn’t move.
I edged the door open slowly and looked behind it. I looked along the wall. I looked over the floor. Then a sickening thought settled into my stomach and I reached out to the towels hanging on the wall, near where the cockroach had scuttled up.
I knocked the first towel.
Nothing happened.
I knocked the second one.
Hideous clack-flapping was my grisly reward, as the cockroach burst out and slapped onto the floor. I shrieked and ducked out the door.
“Get it,” Sean said.
I reluctantly looked back in to find where the roach had scurried to. And I didn’t see it.
“Where did it go?” I moaned.
“It’s under your foot.”
“What? Where?” I backed up. And there it was, zipping at unhuman speeds out of the bathroom and onto the carpet. It nestled itself snugly in the corner.
Predictably, I squealed again.
“Step on it!” Sean said. He was getting impatient. “I don’t have shoes on! Just step on it!” As I raised my shaking foot, he added, “Remember you have to twist, because that carpet’s going to be soft.”
“Ewwwwww…” and the toe of my sneaker came down on the cockroach.
“Twist,” Sean said. “Twist.”
I did.
When I finally raised my foot away, Sean said comfortingly, “There you go. Now vacuum him up.”
I did.
I then collected all the garbage in the apartment, because certainly it’s acting as bait for these freaky little assholes. Then I came back to the office and clung to Sean’s shoulder and let out a little whimper.
He just chuckled.