Sleepin’ in my Shoes

            She was in her room listening to the new Oasis album as the ceiling fan chopped lukewarm air. Chain necklaces hung on the walls rustled like a thin chime. A hamster cage rested on her cluttered desk. Gaudy insects buzzed against the outer window, which cast the lonely evening sun in a longing red glow. The music danced on. 

Found what

I’d lost inside!

My spirit

has been purified!

            She stretched out on the bed. Her fingers ran along the soft, plush blanket. She breathed out slowly and quietly rested herself against the headboard. The restlessness slowly eroded, sea to stone. The drums beat on with courage. The vocals served in three tones, whining into the same vast space. 

Take a

thorn from my pride!

And hand in hand

we’ll take a walk outside!

            Her green, hazel -spotted eyes watched the quiet hamster cage as the little gray ball waddled out of its cute plastic house shaped like an igloo. It grasped the cage door and lazily gnawed and chirped. She giggled and adjusted her headphones. The insects flew into the glass of the window with no luck. 

            The walls hummed as the garage door opened. Loud steps then boomed in the hallway before the door to her room crept open. It was her father in tarred overalls, black soot lathering his face like a mask. His big steel-toe books rested on his feet boastfully. She followed the wire of her headphones and paused the CD player. He smiled, and his teeth looked pristine white. “Listen’ to your new record?”

            “Yep,” she said. “I like it. It’s different.” 

            He curled his brow and she shrugged her shoulders and they both laughed. “When I saw them boys with the bowl cuts on the cover, I surely figured I was different,” he chuckled. He rubbed his palms together, sounding like two pieces of sandpaper, and his tired body leaned against the doorway. He spotted the insects at the window and cursed under his breath before asking how school was that day. She went through her day, listing the sporadic events. She talked about the boy who was scared of her and who also liked her. Her father was secretly impressed with her awareness. He had always felt inept to the tune of love and interest. He never really caught on to those nuances and sped on with life without a backroom disregard. Listening to her talk about this boy, her harsh analysis pleased him. He took out a cigarette and stuck it between his teeth. “Don’t go overthinkin’ it now, Shelley-belly,” he growled, smile still on his face, “he’ll give.” She looked down at her hands and blushed. Her father’s hands fished through his overalls for a lighter when he squinted at the hamster cage. “Now, Shelley, that little door ain’t supposed to be flappin’, is it?”

            She looked over to the open hamster cane and the color in her face flushed away, smile evaporated. Her body stiffened, panic jumped in her eyes as she almost threw the headphones off her head. “Get out with those big books,” she pleaded. “I don’t want you steppin’ on ‘im!”

            He put his hands up and shuffled backward out the doorway. Shelley quickly shut the door and caught her breath, got to her knees and pawed the shag carpet, looked through the bulky bookshelf and the pillow covers, under the bed, beside the end table and all about her desk—nothing. Her sorrow fed the determination to find the hamster she loved so much, with its soft fur and cute squeaks, a small life to care for and cherish, gone in an awful moment. She loved the hamster and the assurance they gave one another and kept searching.

            She pulled open the accordion-style closet doors, studying, then pawing the high self above the hanging rod to no avail. Shoes neatly in a row before her feet, she dug through each one. By the fifth one, she felt something. She yipped with shock and yanked her hand out. The shoe rustled before the hamster’s tiny head arose sleepily like a miniature hibernating bear. Its ears twitched as it rubbed its tired eyes, nose sniffling the air fervently. 

            “What are you doin’?” she asked. The hamster let out a cute chirp. “You can’t be slippin’ in my shoes, mister.” She put out a firm palm and the hamster hesitated before hopping on. She closed her hand carefully so its head poked out and she scratched it. The hamster purred. She put it back in the cage, and it crawled into the little red igloo house---a lost wave finding its shore.

            Night had fallen and the bugs were away. Shelley went to the kitchen and watched her father cook dinner. He was still dirty save for his freshly washed hands. Calluses gleamed on his palms. The unlit cigarette still rested between his teeth. “You find your little rat?”

            “He ain’t a rat!” Their laughs harmonized. “And yes, I did.” 

            “Good deal, Shelley-belly,” he said with admiration as he slipped a full pan into the oven, lighting the cigarette on the hot metal grate before shutting the oven door.