During the early morning hours, I heard the screen door open, and then click shut. My once sleepy eyes popped wide open. I stared through the open doorway of my bedroom fearing to see a human silhouette. I mentally prepared myself to roll off the bed and onto the floor. My mind grasped for ideas of possible weapons to save my family. The only items by my bed were journal, scriptures, and cell phone. Not much of a weapon choice. I was afraid if I woke my husband his startled reaction would make him an easy target for the intruder. My mind shifted to yesterday afternoon. When the sun hit our front window, we noticed someone had waxed our house number on the glass. Now in the dark I wondered if that had anything to do with the noise I just heard. Had our house been marked? Who would mark us? Why were we targeted?
It was a few long moments before I realized no one was coming in and that the noise was just the screen not the back door. I pieced together a less hysterical scenario. The screen door was probably slightly ajar and our Jasper cat might have slipped his orange paws behind the door pulling it out enough to have it pull back and slam shut. He'd done that before during the day. I smiled and closed my eyes. Reasoning it was just our cat allowed me to relax. I also remembered that Mr. Cat wouldn't be able to wake us with his early am attention tactic, a climb up the lattice and pounce to our window screen. The lattice was gone as my husband had removed it yesterday afternoon. A few hours after the screen door scenario, I found out I was wrong about Mr Jasper Cat not being able to make the climb to our window screen. Instead of the lattice, he climbed the stucco wall. It's much to early to wake up at 4:45 am on a Sunday Morning.
