Holy Domestic Disturbance Batman!

"Guess what exciting thing just happened to me?" Torie asked, a grin in her voice.

I looked suspiciously at the speakerphone. "I'm almost afraid to ask."

My best friend laughed. "Oh, it's nothing like that. I had to call the cops tonight, and the officer just left the house."

Torie always does this to me. She'll burst out with some outrageous statement to get my attention, then slowly piece together the story behind it.

"Okay, I'll bite," I told her. "Why were the police at your place?"

"Because I had a bat in the house."

"A bat? The black fuzzy kind?

"Uh huh," Torie replied. "Matt found it in the living room and came upstairs to get me. We tried just about everything to capture it, but couldn't do it. Not that Matt was all that much help. He was so freaked out that he kept hiding behind the door."

Her son Matt is a sweet, shy teenage boy who has an endearing, absent-minded professor sort of way about him. I could easily see why he would find the idea of a furry mammal with sharp teeth flying around the room rather alarming.

"Poor kid."

Torie sighed. "Honestly Juno, the way Matt was acting you would think the Mafia was after him or something. Anyway, I couldn't catch the darn thing, and I was starting to get worried about the dog or cat trying to mess with it and getting a nasty surprise. So I called 911."

"And they actually came?" I asked incredulously.

"Yup. Fast too. I hardly had time to hang up the phone before the officer was in the driveway. I went outside to meet him, and he asked what the problem was. For some reason he seemed to think it was a domestic disturbance call."

I considered. "Well, I guess that's one way of looking at it."

Torie continued, "When I explained the situation to him, he thought it was pretty funny. He kept shaking his head and saying 'A bat call? A bat call?' Said he couldn't wait to tell his lieutenant about this one."

"So did he have something on him to catch it with?" I asked her.

"He used this big tupperware thing that I store cake in. The bat finally decided to hang upside down from the tapestry over my fireplace. The cop put the cover part over the bat, slide the plate under it, and took it outside. Said it was the most exciting thing that had happened to him all night."

I laughed. I imagined it beat the hell out of monitoring the speed traps that her area of town is known for.

"Anyway," Torie went on, "I said 'Thanks Batman' which got him laughing again. He actually got a huge kick out of the whole thing. He said the guys at the station would have a ball with all this--he'd be known as Officer Batman Bentley."

"How old was he?" I was curious.

"Mmmmmm. About forty or so. Sort of average looking. Really nice guy. When he came into the house he commented on how clean and pretty it was. He told me he didn't blame the bat for wanting to hang out in such a nice place."

"Sooooooo. . . " I prompted her. "Did you check for a wedding ring?"

"Yup. Definitely married. He talked about his wife too. He figured she'd love the whole Batman angle."

"It would have been a such great way to meet someone." I sighed regretfully. "Funny, handsome guy in uniform rescues woman from potentially dangerous small mammal. It has all the makings of a great romance."

"True," Torie admitted. "Too bad all the good ones are taken."

"Yeah," I told her. "Maybe next time you should go for Robin."