Stranger At The Door

After 12 hours of continuous drive with just 2-3 breaks for restroom and quick snacks, we reached Indiana, our stay for the night. It was very cold out there. We were dead tired, so we quickly changed and picked up food from an Indian restaurant for dinner. Food was delicious and when you are that hungry, you like everything in your plate.

We watched an episode of Criminals Minds during the dinner. Next day we were to leave for Omaha, so without wasting anymore time, we retired to bed. As room was very cold, Harmit turned on the heater and set it to highest temperature. I believe within 5-10 minutes, we passed out.

I was sleeping like a baby till I heard the sound of keys turning in the lock of our room. Not sure what was the time, but it was too dark. Immediately alerted, I started thinking about the intentions of the intruder and possible plan of action. I was scared, to be truthful, but being the “man” in the room, tried to gain some courage and became ready to confront the murderer or thief (“unsub” as per Criminals Minds) whoever he was.

I rose from the bed with great difficulty and moved quickly towards the door before he can do anything. One thing was clear, I wasn’t going to win in fist-fight as I was feeling very weak and tired. He was right there in a brown leather jacket with beard look, when I opened the door. I asked, actually begged him, to go away and if he wants to have something in particular, just take it and leave. I was really worried as his expressions were not friendly. We didn’t wanted any trouble.

Before I or he could react, I woke up wondering what just happened ? Was it real or just a bad dream. When I came to my senses, I felt too much heat in the room and I was sweating. I got up and turned on the lights and drank water. Harmit also woke up and asked what’s the matter ? I turned off the heater and told her about the dream. We did some introspection and blamed excessive heat and Criminal Minds for the dream. I went to check the door (this time in real), if it is properly locked. Everything was good, so after making sure of security, lights were turned off again.

Lessons learned –

1. Turn off the heater during sleep or at least set it on a decent temperature
2. Don’t watch or read anything disturbing

Good thing that came up from this episode was the feeling of concern for the safety of Harmit, which I never experienced before 😊

Happy Reading ! Keep Traveling !!!