Endless Night*

 The door creaks open in the silent darkness.  A huge fluffy monster squeezes through and pads across the floor.  He bends down, shoves his face into the bowl and crunch crunch crunches his way through some food.

I’m sort-of awake.  As the loud crunching happens, I wake up a bit more.  Drenched in sweat, I try, and fail, to wipe my face.  Crawling through to the bathroom, I bury my face in a towel, wipe it and then fill up my water glass.

When I return to the room, there’s a huge shape crouched on the floor, slurping at a bowl of water.  That’s the fluffy monster, consuming his supper at 2.30am, I see on my watch.

Gulping my own water, I remain calm.  In a minute, I’ll switch the Bodyscan CD on.  Not yet: it will disturb my cat and I don’t want to annoy him.

Now I’m wide awake, turning over everything in my mind.  The fan buzzes and whirrs but I’m still So Hot.  These hot flushes last for a while before I can settle down.

The fluffy monster strides across the room to the door, pulls it towards him with a paw.  It creaks as it opens to let him through.  And then I’m alone again, dripping with sweat, wide awake.

And there are hours and hours of night to get through, still…
*1967.  By Agatha Christie.  Murder mystery.