Even in the deepest throes of terror, some distant part of Sarah's mind knew that it was downright ridiculous to be afraid. But that lofty intellectual side of the brain can never be reconciled with the gut. And whenever Sarah saw one of those blank little faces watching her, her stomach churned, her blood slowed, and goose bumps broke out on her skin.
When Sarah woke up one morning, she headed downstairs for some breakfast as usual. As she was reaching up for the rice krispies, she happened to look out the window over the sink, and she saw them. Five strange little figures, standing stock-still on her front lawn as if waiting for her to come out.
She screamed and fled the kitchen. When she got to the dining room, she looked out the window, expecting to see the creatures coming to get her; but they were frozen in the exact same spot, staring out on her suburban street.
Her father came down with a cup of coffee. "Like my cute garden gnomes, sweetie?”
Cute.
Sarah finally worked up the courage to go outside. She made a wide circle around the front lawn to see them better. They all had red plastic pointy hats and flowing white plastic beards. Their eyes -- the paint for their eyes was chipped, leaving only fractured blue on a field of empty white.
They were watching her with those blind plastic eyes. She was sure one had winked at her that first day.
Before, her nights were peaceful and empty; it was easy to plummet into dreamless sleep. Now, though, she sat up straight with her back pressed against the headboard and pulled the blanket in a tight cocoon around her trembling body. How could she possibly sleep when those strange sentinels were standing guard over her? As soon as she closed her eyes, their sturdy plastic arms would rip loose from their sides and their little hobnailed boots would tread lightly through the grass. One of them had a plastic pickaxe; it would be hard enough to break a window; and then they would seethe up the stairs like radioactive ants. They would take off their long, extremely pointy hats and use them like swords. And all the while those flecked blue-and-white eyes would stare madly, blindly, straight ahead.
Sarah felt terror to the point of nausea. She crouched in her bed, eyes on the bedroom door, waiting for the demonic figures to burst through.
In the morning, she crept downstairs. When she looked out the window, her knees almost buckled for shock.
They had moved.
She was sure of it. Before they had been arranged on the lawn like the dots on a die. Now the center gnome had moved back, so that they were in two rows of three and two. The fear was real. Soon they would take her.
It didn't matter that it was her father who had rearranged the gnomes. Sarah put on her father's football helmet, took her softball bat and sat in her closet until her father agreed to throw out the gnomes. Even then, she sat in her room and stared at the little red hats poking out of the trashcan on the curb until the garbage truck took them away. Only then could she breathe again, and begin to forget those mad eyes.
The gnomes...she feared the gnomes!