Couch Surfing 2: The Unwelcome Surfer

***You may be interested in reading my original post Stranger Danger: Bring It on Home, however it really only serves to explain the title of today's post, and is not required reading to understand the content of the post itself.  So read it, don't read it, who cares.  Sorry, feeling crabby today.***

Have you ever been scared? No, I mean absolutely terrified. Not “Oh ding dang it. I am at the back of the line and might not get tickets for opening night of the new Harry Potter movie and will be the social outcast amongst my social outcast friends” scared. I am talking about “absolutely freaked out, hair standing on edge, fight or flight in full effect, pee running down your leg, holy hell the condom broke” scared. At approximately 5:30 a.m. yesterday morning, I felt the sleep-interrupting sensation of needing to use the restroom. After using the facilities, I stumbled into the living room on my way to grab a drink of water for my parched throat. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed a glimmer of light cascading between the door frame and my front door. I immediately cursed myself for leaving the door unlocked overnight, and figured that the bag of trash I had left on the door to be taken out in the morning had pulled down on the handle and the door had come ajar. I closed the door and then relocked it. I trudged into the kitchen, got a quick sip of water, and started to walk back to my bedroom. And then there, in the living room illuminated by a mix of moonlight and the first glimpses of sunlight, was a human figure, lying recumbent on my couch. My heart began to accelerate as I did a double take, rubbed my eyes cartoon-style to make sure I was not dreaming, and reopened them to find the shadowy figure still reclining on my sofa. I initially considered the figure might be my son “T”, but realized the individual was much taller, and this was definitely an adult individual. I immediately asked in a hushed angry whisper so as not to wake up T, “Who are you? Who the hell are you?” The slumbering individual only responded with the tell-tale “uuuunnnnn” (man, I hate trying to spell out sounds) of a teenager that refuses to be woken up for school on a Monday morning after an exhausting weekend of gallivanting about town with his friends. It was clear to me this individual was asleep, but I still stayed on guard in the event my apartment had been broken into by a team of criminals, and this individual’s partner was hiding somewhere in the apartment. I quickly scanned the other rooms in the house, and found no one else present. Being convinced that my unexpected visitor was in a deep sleep, and had no accomplice hiding in the shadows waiting to slit me from guts to gullet, I decided that I would approach him and wake him up. However, before taking a step closer, I took stock of my lack of clothing. While I had not been sleeping in the buff, awaking a sleeping individual who is obviously in the wrong place in only your undergarments is probably not the wisest of choices, and may cause unnecessary trauma. Further, if I were to awaken him and he went crazy, even though I would not be involved in a naked fist fight, more clothing would be nice if things went awry. (Side note: never get into a naked fight as a male. While you may believe you have an extra advantage as this provides you with an additional appendage with which to flail around at your opponent, doing so with any efficiency or accuracy requires the masterful hip gyrations of a world class hula-hooper. Further, even in it’s most rigid of states, it would certainly cause more pain to the attacker than the attackee if you were skillful, or lucky, enough to land a strike using this technique.)

I quickly retreated to my room to slip on a pair of shorts and a shirt. In my younger days, I collected swords, and still had two stashed on an upper ledge in my closet. As I was still uncertain of what I was going to encounter in the living room, I decided to go Feudal Lord of Japan style, and selected a samurai sword as my self-defense weapon of choice. I crept back into the living room, sword unsheathed with its hardened steel blade glistening in the early morning light. (Yes, I am trying to be heroic in my retelling of the story, but looking back, at that exact moment in time, I was still scared fecaless). The figure still lay on the couch, his position relatively unchanged, save for a leg that was now dangling off the edge. In my mind, I considered my options: 1) jump on the guy, sever his jugular with the sword and let the police sort it out, 2) grab T, run out the front door and then down the street screaming for the police like a couple of heroines escaping a blood bath at the satanic old farm house from a 1980’s horror movie or 3) just try and wake the guy without T hearing us, having him walk into the living room, and then freaking out about a stranger being in the apartment. I inched closer to the guy to attempt to wake him without totally freaking him out. I got close enough to Rip Van Winkle to observe a young, clean-shaven man in his early twenties, dressed in nice jeans, a polo shirt and dress shoes. Given his nicer clothing and “normal” appearance, I began to piece together what might have taken place. I figured this young man was an accidental, inebriated intruder, and had likely stumbled into the wrong apartment on the very night I had accidentally left my door unlocked. I set my sword out of sight so as not to scare the guy, but still within reach in case of an emergency. In a lowered volume, I said “hey man” a couple of times, and gently nudged the guy’s shoulder. His eyelids slowly peeled away from his bloodshot eyes, and I slowly and calmly explained to the young man that I had left my door open, and that he had accidentally wondered into the wrong apartment. He looked at me with a bewildered stare, and then began to look around the apartment, prompting a look of realization on his face that he had screwed up big time. He explained that he had been drinking a lot, and had no idea how he had wound up in my apartment. He went on to explain that he lived in the complex, and found it extremely strange that he stumbled into my upstairs apartment as he lives in a downstairs unit.

I told him I was just happy that he had not been a serial killer who found my door unlocked. He agreed and stated, “I could have caused some serious damage.” Thanks to a thick fog of booze and sleepiness that enveloped his tequila soaked brain, he obviously did not realize that the fortuitous outcome of the situation cut both ways. He easily could have been in a not-so-understanding apartment, pried opened his peepers and found the business end of a revolver being pointed straight at his libation laden head, while an overly anxious elderly gentlemen with an unpredictable case of Parkinson’s gingerly caressed the trigger, waiting, just waiting, for him to make a sudden move resulting in his grey matter being plastered across the living room wall. My new “friend” told me his apartment number and I guided him in the general direction. I would have loved to have helped him more, but I could not leave T in the apartment alone. And so I was forced to watch him stagger across the parking lot toward the other end of the complex while I hoped he found his way home, or at least found another comfy sofa through another accidentally unlocked door.