I Hope The Rattling in My Vents Is A Ghost Because I Am Not Emotionally Equipped to Deal with a Raccoon or Something at This Point In My Life... by William Russell Faber
Every night as I lie in bed, at around eleven P.M., I hear a loud rattling from the vent in the kitchen, and, God, I hope it’s a ghost because I am not emotionally equipped to deal with a raccoon right now. My job’s had me work overtime the last three days, I’m behind in all my classes, and my dad’s in the hospital because a piano fell on him. I just don’t know how to deal with animals. A ghost would be way easier to handle. Look, there are two simple facts about this house: one, no one has come to pick up
the trash in months, so the local vermin have made my space their home, and two, the previous owner died in a barbed wire accident on the roof. When the banging comes around, I’m not sure if it’s from an animal or the ghost of the last tenant. If it turns out to be a skunk or something, I might just have to move out. The best I could theoretically do is put on some rubber gloves, stick a broom handle in there, and flail until the vent, the beast, or my body breaks. But I doubt I could even get out of bed when the world is so much. Could I
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call an exterminator? Not without a double dose of anxiety medication. Every night, I lie in bed and hope the ghost will get it over with and possess me or the animal will give me rabies. Either way, I guess the problem kinda solves itself.