Demon nights

So I'm laying in bed, fast asleep at the quiet dark hour of 3:30 this morning when suddenly and without provocation a demon from the very pits of hell sneaks up on me and jabs his white hot pitchfork deeply into the muscles of my right calf.

Laughing like pure malevolent evil, the archfiend began to rotate his blistering fiery pitchfork of maleficence as if to draw my eternal soul out of each fiber of my triceps surae like so much hell bound spaghetti.

Some how, some way I was able stifle a bone chilling scream that would have roused all of the people in our house, our neighborhood — even the entire city — by grunting loudly through clenched teeth.

Bolting upright in bed and gasping, I clutched at the monkey fist that my muscles had become, trying in vain to rub the knot out and relieved the pain.

I jumped out of bed, my foot twisted by the cramp into a spastic, crippled claw. I stood on the floor and leaned against the bedpost using my body weight to force the muscle to stretch. After a minute or two that seemed like centuries, the calf muscles released their contraction and I began to breathe easier.

Sweat dripping from my forehead, I sat down and massaged my leg, which had ceased to be excruciating and was now merely aching. Eventually I returned to a fitful sleep, restless in the knowledge that just one wrong move would summon the charlie horse demons again.

tagged: night, sleep, cramp, muscle, calf, demon, pain