"Your footsteps give you away."

It doesn't take much to propel me out of bed at 2:27 AM. My brain is usually dying for a stab at paranoia at that hour and my reflexes are unswerving yes-men in the dark. Last night it was a creak--or maybe a snick--that sent me up and about, exploring the undersides of beds, standing still and snuffling for long moments at doorways, coming eerily close to looking like some kind of barefoot invader myself. Probing corners, breath held.

And creeping to the window for the final check.

I never know what to expect when I look out. A flapping dog leash in the form of a noose. A ring of dancing jackrabbits (sinister animals). Maybe an eye peering back. But I was not prepared, in bending back the blind, for it to make the same noise that woke me. At that hour strange logic asserts itself and I felt sure that it could have only been me that I had heard minutes ago--standing there, dreaming myself back in bed and waking myself in turn. Or maybe I'd been late for my nightly appointment at the window and some ghostly impulse had given the blinds a sympathetic flick. Anyway, I was comforted where I probably should not have been, and followed my previous and future shades back to sleep.