"Aaaugh! Scary elbow!"

This is a cry I hear many a night, often awakening me in the wee hours. It seems that my elbow has become a terrifying menace to Pär.

You know how there's always at least one extra arm in the way when two people sleep together? Mine has developed a predatory instinct. I don't know what's changed about my sleeping positions, exactly -- the elbows just always seem to end up pointed at Pär's face. I guess I used to tuck my "extra arm" discreetly away by lying on top of it. But ever since I got the RSI, I haven't wanted to squish my arms and cut off circulation, so nowadays I sleep on my stomach or my side with arms akimbo.

To show what I mean, I have drawn up some helpful illustrations below. (Pär doesn't actually sleep with his arms straight up like that; it is my attempt to symbolically express his fear upon sighting Scary Elbow pointed at him.)

Whether my hands are up under my pillow or down by my side, the arms are always cocked elbow-out and Pär opens his eyes to find a sharp bony elbow three inches away from his face. When he's half-asleep, this takes on the quality of nightmare.

And that's when I hear the gasping cry: "Aaugh! Scary elbow!"

It's become a real phobia with Pär.

"This is serious, Karen, it's not a joke. Your elbow, it comes to me in the night. It's after me. It's going to kill me."

"Pär, it's just an elbow. It never actually touches you, you know. You've never been hurt by it."

"It's waiting. You're waiting. Biding your time, lulling me into relaxing my guard."

I made my elbow suddenly appear above the covers and confront him face-on. His whole body twitched violently.

"Aaugh! Scary elbow!" He gasped for breath, glaring at me. "Witchy woman!"

"I'm not! I'm just Elbow Woman."

"Witches have elbows," he said ominously.

This has been going on for weeks. Finally one morning I lost patience, grabbed his upper arm, and vigorously prodded it with my elbow. Pär looked down at his arm and then at me in amazement.

"Is that your elbow?"

"Yes!"

"That's all it can do?"

"Yes!"

He burst out laughing, delighted. "It's puny!"

"I'm telling you! All this time you've been scared of nothing."

He sobered, considering. "It could still hurt my face," he mused. "If it tried."

Last night he came to bed after I'd already fallen asleep. I awakened to the familiar cry, "Aaugh! Scary elbow!"

"You poor thing," I said sleepily. "Living with the constant terror."

"My life has become very simple these days," he said. "There's work, and love, and food... and Scary Elbow."

"I guess Scary Elbow figures pretty big in your consciousness, huh."

"It looms."

"Didn't we have a moment a few days ago," I asked, "when you realised that Scary Elbow was puny? I know we did, because I wrote it all down to use in a journal entry."

"That moment doesn't seem real now," he said. "Compared to the terror of seeing Scary Elbow lurking there, waiting to get me. You remember that evil sentient machine ship in The Matrix, that shows up and hovers outside the good guys' ship, looking at it, deciding whether or not to destroy it?"

"That ship is how Scary Elbow feels to you?"

"Sometimes in the night, I open my eyes and I'm staring at Scary Elbow. And I have a stark, animal-panic reaction. It's like looking out your window and seeing a man standing right there watching you, or turning around to find a huge beast about to pounce at you."

It does sound pretty frightening, when he puts it like that. I think I'll at least start using some moisturizing lotion on my elbows. That ought to make them a little less alarming a sight. There's only so much I can do about it, though. If Scary Elbow ever decides to attack, I'm afraid it will have its way with Pär's face. After all, I sleep through the whole thing.