The Intruder

She sat and stared. Hours passed before she moved. As she stood up and approached the 13 inch dildo she knew it was now or never

Or later? She thought. I could wait. What's the harm in waiting to see what happens? Fools rush in, and all that. What was it her grandfather used to say? Fortune favours the something. Brave? Well, that wasn't helpful. Hesitant. Fortune favours the hesitant. That sounded better. And something about a rabbit and a turtle, but in her current mindset she couldn't remember what, although she thought it might be pertinent. And anyway, she continued, which one was the turtle again? Is that the one that lives in water? Or was that a tortoise? In that case, what the hell is a terrapin?

She had started to mentally babble like an infinitely flushing toilet. Which, she accepted, wasn't entirely surprising, and more than a little understandable. She looked at her watch. She was briefly confused, as she found her wrist staring back up at her, and tried to remember how to tell the time according to the two moles she was familiar with, before realising she wasn't wearing a watch. Or indeed own one any more. I must get a new watch, she thought. She checked herself.

"Babbling!" she chided, aloud.

A hand suddenly clasped itself over her mouth, shocking her for as long as it took her to recognise it was her own hand, in an attempt at self preservation. Quiet! she thought. There was an alarm clock on the table beside her bed. Minutes had passed, not hours. Since she heard the intruder in her kitchen, and found the dildo as the only viable weapon to hand, she had succeeded in procrastinating for mere minutes. Minutes, if left to their own devices would turn naturally to hours, thought her inner coward, helpfully. Hours in which you could sleep, they added.

No! she thought, with resolve she didn't know she had. In fact, the vehemence with which she denied herself surprised her. She found that the timidity with which she had initially approached the noises she heard emanating from her kitchen below had now been replaced with anger, and dare she say it, even excitement. She lunged forward, took the dildo in both hands, and strode to her bedroom door. With her grandfathers words about discretion being the better part of something, she quietly opened the door, and tip-toed out onto the landing.

She made the mistake of looking down at her feet. No shoes, she thought. I can't do this without shoes. What if I have to chase him? What if there is broken glass? What if the floor is cold? Do I want dirty feet?

She slowly reversed into her room, and shut the door. Her shoes lay in a confused muddle at the bottom of the largest wardrobe in her room. She had shoes for every occasion. Almost every occasion, she reminded herself, thinking about the intruder downstairs.

Slippers? Not practical. Her bad week evening party black strappy sandals with diamanté butterflies? Not practical enough. Sure she could dance in them, and she liked they way they made her feel, but they had started to rub recently, and she resented them for it. Cowboy boots? They were too small, so took her an age to get on and off. Mid-beach-holiday early evening sangria party mules? Cute, but off message. Rummaging around, she found one half of the pair that, while not perfect, would do nicely.

She opened the door again, and stepped out onto the landing in her brown ruched suede calf boots with a kitten heel. Being relatively practical, she could just about run in them (but no great distance) and were smart while saying to the observer "I have more important things to do than to be with you, but here I am so be grateful". She had initially only bought them to go to a cheese tasting with an old school friend of hers, who she remembers fancying at school, but couldn't remember why they never got it on. The shoes had been perfect then, and were a close fit now.

Moving gingerly over the landing, she peered over the bannister railing. At the foot of the stairs, the door to the kitchen was open, and an ethereal glow emanated from within.

Bugger, she thought. I've got a burglar AND I left the fridge door open. A few rational neurones politely cleared their throats. Unless... Oh! Unless HE opened the fridge. Stupid, stupid, stupid! The neurones considered this. But why would a burglar raid the fridge...? I suppose burglars must get hungry too... Well, if you're hungry, you're hungry... The only thing of value was some rather nice cheese she had picked up from Borough Market, and a half-finished (half-started, she corrected herself) bottle of Musquadet. Thank god I didn't put my jewellery in the meats drawer, she thought.

Enough! the most rational neuron said. She shook her head and tried to think clearly. It doesn't matter, she thought, that someone is in my fridge. The important factor is that he shouldn't be there. She crept down the stairs, trying to remember which stairs creaked, and which were safe, a task at which she succeeded in achieving a 100% failure rate. Each reluctant groan, every crack, seemed to her a traitor in her own home; a huge klaxon warning the intruder of his impending discovery.

Or her, she supposed to herself. She paused on the third step from the bottom. She hadn't considered the possibility that the burglar might be a woman. She looked at the rubber phallus in her hands. Was it right to hit a girl with this? Maybe she should find something else. She was getting distracted, and shook her head again. She moved down a step.

The fridge was still open. How long had it been so? Did the guy have no sense for the environment? The milk bottles clinked together guiltily. The expensive cheese was behind the milk bottles! The bastard! She moved down another step.

She was now at the last location she could conceivably argue as still being upstairs, albeit only up one stair. She could turn around now, feign ignorance and let the interloper consume her Stilchester cheese, waste her electricity, and never see her flattering footwear. She could, but didn't. The shoes propelled her forwards. She took the last step, and leaned cautiously round the corner, the bendy dildo leading the way as she peered into the kitchen.

There was a man, with his head in her vegetable basket. She considered this, and gave a childish and inappropriate grin at the image. If only, she thought. He was wearing a dark green, heavy knit sweater, blue jeans and a baseball cap. However, it was his smart burnt oak semi-brogue shoes that caught her eye. She was quietly impressed and confused in equal measure. With renewed courage that any man with those shoes couldn't mean her much harm, she stepped determinedly into the kitchen, raised the dildo, and screamed.

The shock to the man was profound. He quite forgot his head, or specifically where it was, and raised it at great speed. The fridge was not forgiving, and the sickening clunk-crack of his skull against the roof of the appliance caused her to wince. He rallied briefly, and managed to retract his bonce, kneeling woozily from the impact. He turned, swaying, on the brink of unconsciousness, just in time to see all 13inches of the flesh coloured love toy collide with his terrified face with all the strength she could muster. For the second time that evening, his head wished it was somewhere it wasn't, and he collapsed to the floor, out cold.