Scratching his head, Travis drifts into the living room, feeling late morning on his head like a burro; hairy, warm, scratchy and possibly getting ready to kick him. He has awoken from a gelatin-thick dream of trying to put together the pieces of an invitation to the world’s greatest party of… but wondering the whole time if it was really worth the effort. His roommate’s stereo in the next room is blaring the sounds of a mariachi band, and Travis feels stuck in a movie with bad pacing. The sunbeams pour in through the blinds, thick and tangible, dust swirling and alighting on the fuzzy edges of everything. “I didn’t wanna go to a stupid party anyway,” he mumbles to the invisible mariachi players. In synch, the too-giddy Spanish guitars reach a climatic tremolo as a loud, persistent knocking at the door barges into Travis’s head and pushes his brain down. While gathering his wits, Travis eyes the door, knowing that if he stands very quiet and–and who the hell left the stereo on anyway? He was alone in the place, had been all week, roommates away doing things that roommates do when they’re away. He looks around suspiciously to make sure there’s no one there but him and his mess is all the evidence he needs.

The knocking continues and Travis looks to the door again and squints. “Fine. I’ll get it,” he says to no one in particular, “but if it’s Jehovah’s witnesses I’m gonna’ go crazy on their shit.” Travis opens the front door slowly, revealing the brilliant light of a clear day, and the silhouette of an imposing purple jellybean. The guitars rattle and a trumpet sounds the arrival of a mysterious hero.

“May I help you?” Travis asks, vainly attempting to remove crust stuck good to the corners of his eyes. As Travis’s vision adjusts to the light, the man comes into focus, the light from the outside giving the lavender encapsulated exterminator the appearance of divinity.

“You’re not a Jehovah’s witness.”

The little man pushes Travis aside and enters the apartment announcing, “I have come for the denizens, sir,” in the thickest of southern preacher accents.

“Damn. I was gonna’ go crazy on their… The denizens?” Travis asks sleepily, the archaic word having sunk to the bottom of his brain.

“Wicked bugs, sir,” the exterminator states, adjusting his glasses. They are as thick as bottle glass, magnifying the short man’s eyes as large as cup saucers, one eye wandering in the opposite direction of the other. He sniffs the air for a minute as if to identify prey and glimpses about the room quickly. “Can’t ya’ feel em?” he asks.

“Yeah. They’re in the kitchen,” Travis says, pointing to the kitchen, wondering if it’s Tuesday or Thursday.

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