Sign Of Foul Play

The jolt came out of nowhere. I sat up rigid in my sofa bed and felt the mattress tremble beneath me. A second force hit. Casper, my signal dog, leaped onto the bed for safety but I was too frightened to comfort my shaking Siberian husky. The sharp impact, followed by a rolling aftermath, lasted nearly a minute. Plenty of time to realize the ride wasn't part of my scandalous dream about the bare-chested pirate, who looked suspiciously like my new office neighbor, only with an eye patch. Plenty of time to take some kind of defensive action. But I couldn't move. I sat squeezing my great-grandmother's patchwork quilt in one hand and gripping the side of the bed in the other as I watched the overhead crystal lamp sway gently in the early morning light. "God, that was a big one!" I surveyed the room for proof of devastation, expecting tumbled-down bookcases, fallen wall hangings, broken cosmetic bottles, even a crack in the wall. But my superficial scan revealed nothing seriously damaged. A few framed comic books leaned to one side, an empty Sierra Nevada beer bottle had hopped off the TV, my hearing aid, the one I sometimes wear in my left ear to pick up high and low noises, had danced a few inches from its spot on the end table, and a copy of my newspaper--theEureka!,--had slipped from my bed to the floor. I wiped my perspiring forehead with my coveted Underdog sheets, and patted Casper who refused to get off my lap. I lay back down, tentatively. Great reflexes, Connor, I told myself, remembering something about door frames from an article I had once written for theSan Francisco Chronicleon earthquake preparedness. I ought to pay more attention to my own work. I don't like earthquakes. That's unusual in a California native. We're supposed to be used to them--no big deal. We earthquake-raised kids are supposed to lift our heads from the rubble, glance around, and say, "What? Did you feel something? I didn't notice." I should be used to them. We get quakes here in the gold country all the time, but most of them are too mild to be felt. The bigger ones are infrequent. But unlike most hearing people, I'm very visually oriented. I need to feel rooted to the ground or I get the strange sensation I've been cut loose from the planet. I have that feeling sometimes anyway, being deaf. But when the earth moves out of control, it has a way of shaking my very foundation. I gazed out the window and watched the shimmering live oak trees through the woven bedroom curtains my mother had given me when I'd moved into this old diner-turned-home several months ago. Although it had taken a great deal of work to restore, the Claim Jump Diner suited me perfectly as living quarters. I spent most of my time in the large back room off the kitchen, which now housed my sofa bed, computer, TV, TTY, and treasured comic book collection. I took a deep breath and inhaled the distinct smell that gives Flat Skunk its notorious name. Outside, it looked to be another sweltering August day in the Mother Lode, part of northern California's Sierra Mountains. I checked the glowing numbers on the Shake-Awake alarm clock--6:04--closed my eyes, and tried to get back on that pirate ship. Must have worked. The next I knew, my vibrating bed alarm was urgently shaking me awake and it was seven A.M. "Idoo eeldeh erfcake assite?" I said to Casper,Warner, Penny is the author of 'Sign Of Foul Play ', published 1997 under ISBN 9780553763218 and ISBN 0553763210.