I first heard the little bastard when he moved a cup in the cupboard and it rapped on the wooden door. I sat, arm frozen in suspense with a spoon full of oatmeal oozing from the spoon back into the slush pile on the table. The clock on the kitchen wall kept ticking while the world around me stayed still, my mind moving in directions of how to destroy the little bastard.

The phone ringing brought me back from the dead of stillness.

I rose, shuffled along the peeled linoleum to the phone dangling from the wall to pick it up and listen to the jabber on the other side of the wires.

“Hey, Hun!” Mother yelled. “How bout we go over to the farmer’s market today? I know how much you love them fresh eggs. I need some jam for…”

“I’m busy,” I said, staring at the cabinet the little bastard revealed himself in.

“Oh, Hun c’mon now. You’ve been cooped in that apartment since the day you moved your junk inside of it. You need some fresh air and momma is trying to take care of that.”

“I said I’m busy and don’t call my collectables junk,” I said.

“Well, Sweetie, that was my fault. I know how much your precious jun…stuff is to you. Alright then, maybe I’ll just come on by later this afternoon. How does three o’clock suit you?” Mother asked.

I’d woken up late on this Saturday morning, so the tick-tocking clock showed 11:30 back in big, bold font. I had three and a half hours before mother arrived to annoy the piss out of me, three and a half hours to get that little bastard in my cupboard.

“Bring an early dinner because I ain’t cooking,” I said.

“Oh yes, Hun! I already made your favorite – baked macaroni. Be a good boy until I get there. Bye-bye now,” she said as I clung the phone back into the receiver.

Three and a half hours.

11:30

My first order of business was getting the stench off my body before I scavenged after the little bastard. The oatmeal on the table hardened as I left it unfinished and shuffled to the bathroom, generating electricity beneath my toes.

The water sprinkled over me as the goosebumps started to show on my flaky skin. The drain stayed half clogged from the hair that wiggled free from my scraggly beard. A small puddle ceremoniously staying at my heels, mocking me to clean up, mocking me that I’m still too dirty.

I turn the nozzle to the right, shutting off the flow, and step out to face the broken mirror. Stains of exhaustion stapled across my face made me look much older than twenty-three. I liked the look. Nobody else liked the look. I needed the look to keep the silence and that little bastard in my cupboard was disturbing my peace.

I squirted some cinnamon toothpaste on my index finger and began exploring my mouth’s nooks and crannies trying to make it clean. My teeth screamed at me for the dental hygiene I was trying to provide. Years of neglect started to show in the divots of my once pearly-whites. The crooked teeth turning themselves at impossible angles. That’s when I heard the squeak.

I paused, tiny globs dripping from my bottom lip as I tried to pinpoint that little bastard. He was mocking me. Making me ruin my schedule of organizing my treasures just to hunt his little bastard ass. I looked at myself through the broken shards clinging to the frame. Those grey eyes not responded to my own appearance, just mocking me of the boy I had once been. The little bastard squeaked again, bringing me back to the present, bringing me back to the annoyance.

The phone started ringing again, so I covered myself with a hand towel and shuffled back across the carpet.

“Hun, thank god you answered!” Mother said on the line. “I forgot to ask if you wanted coke or juice for dinner. I know how much you love apple juice, but coke also pairs well with…”

“Coke is fine,” I said.

“Are you sure you don’t want the apple juice? You used to slurp it right up and…”

“Then bring the juice,” I said.

“Hmph. I’ll just bring both over in the cooler and let you decide. How’s that sound, Hun?”

“Fine,” I said.

“Alright, Hun! I’ll let you get back to your jun…stuff then. See you soon.”

Another squeak and the small patter of miniscule toes traveled to my ears from the linoleum that covered the kitchen. That little bastard was following me, seeing what I was doing, distracting me from my day.

“I’ll find you, little bastard, and you’ll wish you never walked into this place.”

12:00

I decided to wear my holey cargo shorts and the shirt that’s been resting on my floor for two weeks now. My oily, black hair was still drip-dropping on my shoulders as I pulled the black hoodie over my torso. The protruding hairs on my toes got covered by the mismatch socks I found in the dresser drawer, all while I was stepping over the collectable magazines, newspapers, books, and comics I kept around the house. I didn’t need shoes for this job, I just needed to wait and see what the little bastard decided to pull next.

All along the brown stained beige walls of my apartment were newspapers hung like wallpaper. Those were my favorites. Various important news, breaking news, horrific news stories constantly staring at me, begging me to read them. Most of the time I spent in my apartment was organizing and hanging these stories. I would hunt the streets when I left home to the store to buy more oatmeal and TV dinners, despite me reading magazines or comics in the evenings instead of rotting my brain with pixels.

I stood admiring the articles pinned to the walls when I heard another squeak from the kitchen. That awful decibel snapping me back to the task at hand. Distracting me for what I needed to get done in today’s few hours, especially before mother arrived with her voice box that never seemed to quit.

I quietly shuffled my way to the kitchen and peered along the wall where the kitchen laid. There he was, the little bastard, dangling from the bowl rim to pick at the oatmeal I left unfinished. The oatmeal I was saving for later. My oatmeal.

I didn’t have any tools with me, a hammer would have been the best bet. The splatter of the little bastard’s body would have stretched across the table, but it would be so rewarding. The broom sat across the kitchen, unable for me to reach without notifying the little bastard and giving him plenty of time for his escape. A bowl left on the counter right next to the phone would work well, allowing me to choke out the little bastard and torture him for invading my space, but he could maneuver his way from the plastic grasps and escape back to ruining my life. My only option seemed to be rolling up a magazine from the discard table and timing myself just right to beat the little shit out of the little bastard.

I selected a cooking magazine from 2003 that has been sitting in that pile since 2003. I rolled the crisp pages gently to make the tightest possible whack-a-mouse stick. My eyes stayed glued to the little bastard eating small grains of oatmeal, my oatmeal, and squeaking with delight after every bite of the delicious maple flavor.

With my battering object in hand, I slowly began to slide over the linoleum flooring with ease, trying not to scare the little bastard away. He was too invested in his oatmeal, my oatmeal, to realize his maker was coming for him. I stood towering above his grey, fluffy body. I wondered if the magazine would have enough force to make him splat or if he would be flattened by the blow.

I raised my arms above my drying, oily hair when there was a knock at the kitchen door.

I flashed my grey eyes at the little bastard and he flashed his beady, black eyes up at me. Terror written over each of our faces.

I slammed the magazine down with a thud as I aimed at the bowl of hardened oatmeal the little bastard was feasting from. I didn’t understand why I closed my eyes when I came down with such force, but when I opened them, the little bastard was scurrying across the linoleum into the living room where piles of my collectables formed a labyrinth of undetectable hiding spots.

I took off after him, my socks slipping underneath the crinkled linoleum, causing me to crash on my front side. A belly flop on this summer day on the ground instead of a cool pool. When I opened my eyes after the initial blow of the fall, I only saw the little bastard slip through the cracks of some piles stacked against the wall.

I grumbled as I pushed myself up from the cold floor and shuffled towards the kitchen door. The incompetent delivery truck driver always came to the kitchen door, despite the sign I created that states deliveries should be made to my front door. My anger and frustrating subsided as I looked down and saw my new shipment of magazines. Crisp, colorful, new magazines just for me.