Free Tipsy by Cambria Hebert Page A

the shaking?
That was all Blue.
    Once I was inside, I waved to her and
Craig and then shut the door and leaned against it. The quiet
serenity of my home enveloped me like a giant hug. I sighed in
relief. I was so on my way to becoming one of those crazy old women
who lived alone and watched reruns of Jeopardy all day
long.
    Upstairs, I yanked off my boots and
clothes, leaving them in a giant heap in the center of the floor. I
padded into the bathroom to wash off my makeup and comb out my
hair. I clipped my bangs away from my face with a little pink clip
that was lying on the edge of the sink.
    After pulling on a too-big T-shirt, I
crawled into bed and sighed.
    I closed my eyes.
    I saw his face.
    My eyes sprang back open.
    I sat up, yanked the clip out of my
hair, and tossed it across the room, where I heard it clatter in
the darkness. A frustrated growl vibrated my throat as I kicked the
blankets around frantically, freeing my feet and twisting the
sheets into a pile in the center of the mattress.
    My stomach seemed to revolt from all
the movement and my head began to pound.
    “ Really?” I yelled in the
darkness. “I’m going to get a nasty hangover from one and a half
drinks?”
    I leaned back against my padded
headboard and tried to calm my rolling stomach. As I sat there,
trying not to barf, a light sound caught my attention.
    It was the closing of the front
door.
    I perked up, forgetting all about the
fact I was suffering from an attack of an unsuspecting
hangover.
    Had I forgotten to lock the
door? I never forgot to lock the door. But I was usually not running from my best
friend.
    Great.
    The one time I don’t lock the damn door
is the one time a burglar decides to come a’ calling.
    Too bad for mister criminal
I had a plan for something like this. I was the kind of girl
that always had a
plan.
    I crept into the bathroom, being as
quiet as I could, and reached into the cabinet. I pulled out my
weapons (hey, all the crap women have to do to themselves to look
good definitely qualify as weapons) and gripped them closely to my
chest with both hands.
    My heart was beating so hard against my
ribs that it actually hurt and I had to work to not gasp for
breath. Catching my intruder by surprise was key to my
plan.
    Moving quickly through the dark, I
moved to the bedroom door, leaning against the wall and peering out
into the darkened hallway. I could see the top of the stairs from
where I stood, as well as the railing that ran alongside the
hallway to keep someone from falling into the stairwell from
upstairs.
    Courtesy of the nightlight down in the
entryway (it came in handy when I wanted a drink in the middle of
the night); I saw a shadow move against the wall. The figure was
large and distorted against the tall bare wall of the
stairwell.
    Up until that point, I hadn’t been
certain someone was in the house.
    But now I couldn’t deny it.
    There was a robber in my
house.
    He for sure had nefarious
plans.
    Too bad for him I had a really shitty
night and wasn’t in the mood.
    As his foot stepped on the bottom
stairs, I slinked out the door and along the wall, keeping my eyes
trained on the top of the stairs. He began climbing (I was very
unimpressed with his quietness, or rather lack thereof), and as he
climbed, I slipped along the wall, moving through the darkness
until I was standing in the corner directly across from the top of
the stairs.
    I saw his shoulders appear as he
continued upward. He was wearing a dark coat and a dark hat… He was
nothing but a large, ominous shape in the night.
    I swallowed. The sound of my saliva
scraping down my dry throat made me wince, and my palms were
sweaty, causing me to tighten my grip on my weapons.
    Oh yeah. I forgot.
    I had weapons. I had a plan.
    Just as his foot cleared the top step,
I gave a battle cry and leapt forward, brandishing my weapon—a very
large can of hairspray—which I pointed and pressed down on the
top.
    The can hissed as a cloud of very
nice-smelling