Kittens On Rollerskates

So you may be asking yourself who the fuck Jeffrey is, or maybe you aren’t but whatever. Point is, I have a demon! Or ghost/tormentor/poltergeist, it’s a semantics issue. It’s a reader’s choice situation. And dude, Jeffrey is a fucking dickhole. As far as I can tell he’s not about trying to tip a bookcase on me or directly kill me, he’s just a little bastard. Think like worse than pranks but better than murder. At least so far.

Um so. Firstly, I know I’ve told y’all that I’m completely uninterested in hearing about your dreams, but I’m more completely uninterested in applying rules to myself, so here goes. One night, I was sleeping, right? And my dream was so fucked up. It was like, me and these two people I don’t know in real life, and we were trying to escape from this house. And this house was about to collapse, but I didn’t know why. So we got out on the porch, and I turned around all “Booyah! What up wif it! I got us out! Ha ha! Ha!” But instead of actually having something to boast about there on the porch, I looked into the house and there was this coat rack with a scary mask on it? And the mask turned towards me and smirked, then totally froze and went back to doing nothing, so nobody else saw it. And I did this killer ice grill straight at him and pointed mean-dad-style, like where the back of your hand is facing up, and I go “I KNOW you’re Jeffrey.” Then Jeffrey winked at me and then I woke up. But I knew it was a big deal somehow, and sure enough, crazy shit has been happening ever since.

Sort of like this, but he was wearing a jaunty hat.

For example. One time, I was showering at a friend’s, and the house was fucking fah-reezing. Arctic. My guess is that people from Wisconsin don’t believe in comfort because they’ve known too much hardship. So, he turned on the ceiling heater for me, which was presumably intended to not end horribly, which it 100% did. First off, the shower blowed. It was like getting slowly spit on by someone that hates you, but colder. When the shower ended and it was time to scrape the ice off of myself and put on every item of clothing at my disposal, even those that weren’t mine, I reached for the dial to turn the heater off. I touched the dial and the LIGHTS STARTED FLASHING  AND THE SOUNDS STARTED GOING CRAZY AND THE SHIT LIT ON FIRE AND FLAMES WERE EVERYWHERE AND SPARKS RAINED DOWN AND SMOKE FILLED MY LUNGS BUT NOT IN A CIGARETTE WAY AND I HAD NO DEFENSE OR IDEAS.  I was like, “Oh my god? Jeffrey, right?”

A few days later, a friend and i were just kind of cold lamping in my living room, and we were like eight feet apart and the remote was another five feet from us. Just talking, right? Spitballin’. Then, for no reason either of us can understand, the TV and the DVD player turned on. On. And when the DVD player turns on it goes “Hello” across the screen. Jeffrey. Bro. You are not that cool. If I saw your spectre at the bar, I would ignore you. I don’t want to hang out. So…go away. We  just kind of looked at each other, expecting one of us to be responsible somehow, but uh-uh. Simply not possible. In Review: The Television and DVD Player Turned Themselves On. Mkay.

And just a few nights ago, I was asleep so soundly. Like the kind where there’s no reaching you because you’re Dreaming About Clouds and shit, or more accurately, the kind where you took a Valium and drank a bourbon to stave off the nightterrorz (also my Twitter name–follow me!) (Just slapped own face). There I am in a deep sleep, when all of a sudden I hear a knock right behind my head, like “Shave And A Haircut!” No, like if you were knocking on a door and needed to do that rhythm, not like the actual words. Out of nowhere I was completely awake, definitely by like the last two knocks.  It came from the wall behind me, which made me have to do a complete condo search at 3 am, which was terrifying. I bought my bed largely because it’s too low to the ground for someone to hide under so you don’t have to bend over and check to see who is lurking under there, thereby creating the perfect time for a killer to strike from behind, but even so. You don’t have to be bending over a haunted bed for everything in your life to be suddenly horrifying.

And then the other day, a friend was here, but then had to go do work or whatever. So every time someone leaves I lock the shit out of the door, and this time in particular, I walked her out and I know I locked it. Yet an hour later I’m doing one of my favorite things, laying splayed out on the bed perfectly still. Despite all the hard work I was immersed in, I was all, “Shit! The construction sounds from outside are so loud! Why are they so goddamn loud? Those workers are a block away! Right? Are they actually doing construction inside of my home? And I just didn’t know? Huh!” I went and checked it out and here’s why: THE FUCKING FRONT DOOR IS STANDING WIDE OPEN. That’s why so loud. Completely all the way open, and unlocked. Now, I know I’m super slack about a lot of things, but I live in a neighborhood that is quite literally on the wrong side of the tracks, like one time a crackhead brandished those long gardening shears at me at noon, so trust, I do not leave my door unlocked. Q: So how did the front door get unlocked and open? A: Jeffrey is a son of a bitch.

I’m so over it. In addition to the bigger events, there are things like lights that won’t turn on when I hit the switch, but that obediently spring into action when someone else tries. Or the night I’m spooning Bobo Dawg in bed because we’re both so freaked out by all the random knocks and bangs and whispers occuring all over the damn place, which only stop when I yell “Jeffrey! SHUT THE FUCK UP.”

HOLY SHIT. OKAY. THIS LITERALLY JUST HAPPENED, right this fucking second. I heard a weird sound like people talking really quietly beneath the Mickey Avalon I’m rawkin out to. So I go exploring, and um. The sound is coming from my laptop, which is fully closed and has been since 4 am this morning, when I put down my Night Screwdriver and turned in (I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Vitamins). I was in there like 30 minutes ago putting away my clothes, and yeah, that wasn’t happening. I opened it and here’s the picture on the screen. Seriously.

Can You. Imagine. My Terror. Right Now. Please come over.

Is he trying to tell me something about who the fuck he is/was? Dude I’m freaking the fuck out. I think maybe he’s pissed that I’m writing about him. I need to stop before shit gets fatal. I am completely, sincerely, genuinely requesting you guys’ advice right now, on the really real. This is Really Real Talk: Do any of you have any ideas about how to end this once and for all? Am I gonna need a priest, or what? Does it count as holy water if Bobo blesses it? Do I burn sage? Chant something? Hide forever?

Editor’s Note, like maybe eight months later: Jeffrey has left the building. I didn’t do anything that I or anybody else suggested, because evidently even getting haunted isn’t sufficient motivation to do work.  He just kind of bounced one day. The only bizarro-world thing that has happened since then is I pulled out an Alice Cooper record I got at a yard sale that I hadn’t listed to yet and A PICTURE FELL OUT OF A GUY WITH HIS HANDS TIED BEHIND HIS BACK IN THE CORNER OF A FILTHY ROOM, causing me to shatter into small pieces and scare the dog. Doesn’t feel like Jeffrey though, not his steeze. What it does feel like is that I visited the yard sale of a fucking serial killer and am lucky to have escaped with my life. The end!