My Mother the Gremlin

Glendale —  One October morning, I was eating breakfast with my mom, and I noticed that there was a strange hair growing out of her nose. “Honey, what are you staring at?” Mom asked. “Uh, well, uh, I wasn’t staring,” I mumbled. “Well, I thought you were,” she said. Oh great, I had just blown it totally. I hate it when she comes to conclusions like that! It really throws me off.

It was really creepy with that hair growing out of Mom’s nose. I wondered if she could be a gremlin. I had to discover the truth. Was my mother some kind of a real haunted gremlin?

The first thing the next morning, I went straight to the school library. I found a thick dusty book in the witchcraft section of the library. The book was called “Gremlins, Goblins and Other Spooky Creatures.” I read quickly until I found the chapter that I was looking for, “How to Recognize a Gremlin.” The first sentence described how each gremlin has a strange hair growing out of his or her nose. The book also said that gremlins only have three toes on the left foot. I shuddered when I read this. I have always wondered why Mom kept her shoes and socks on all the time, even at the beach! I decided that tonight when everyone was asleep I would find out the truth.

I waited until the house was quiet that night. I slipped out of bed and tiptoed into my mom’s bedroom. She was sound asleep. Her left foot was sticking out ofthe covers. She had on her strange sleep socks that she always wears to bed. I quietly slipped off her sock. She groaned in her sleep. Her left foot had only three toes!!! I almost screamed. I raced out the door and back to my bedroom. My heart was pounding, and I was breathing quickly. I couldn’t believe that my mother was a gremlin! “Maybe I’ll be one too when I grow up!” I moaned.

In the morning, I asked my mother the question, “Are you a gremlin?”

“Why, yes, I am,” she cackled. “How did you know?”

“Well, I looked at your left foot,” I said.

A week later, I noticed a strange hair growing out of my nose. Well, I guess that means I am a gremlin too!