One Mannequin Too Many

My dad and his brothers had decided that they wanted to add a new location in town to sell furniture and appliances because the were out growing the business in the mercantile store on the south end of town. The building that they purchased was on Central Avenue behind Jay's Department Store and across the street from Threat's kitchen entrance. And next door was Blue Bell's Cafeteria, that later became Champion Mills.

The building had been a dress shop with it's previous owner. (Ideal's Dress Shop) When you walked in the door there were to display windows on either side of the doors. On the side walls there was a balcony on each side with area above for storage, It was built to look like a front porch wit turned white post and white railings. The floors were oak and the walls had a white plaster over the brick. When you got half-way back into the store it widened out to twice its size and in the far right hand side was a large restroom with a small window facing a alley behind Jay's Department Store. The restroom window had bars on it like a jail house.

On the other side of the back was a set of double doors that opened onto a walled in patio, the walls were from the other three buildings that joined our building. Between the restroom and the patio was a large paneled office with windows on three sides and a fireplace in the middle. It was in this room that we found a Mannequin and many pieces of mannequin's.

We decided that when we saw this mannequin that we would take it home and have fun with some of our guest that came from time to time to visit us.

She was a blond and we named her Matilda. Matilda started out riding in the car with my sister because she worked in Athens and was going to school at night and my dad put her in the passenger seat and it looked like two people were in the car instead of only my sister. Matilda served her well and she never had a problem driving alone at night.

One night two of our brother workers came to spend a few days with us and as the bedroom that they were sleeping in had a bathroom we had an idea for Matilda.

While we were visiting after supper in the Living Room with our company my brother and one of my sister's were supposed to be doing their homework, but instead the were setting up Matilda in the restroom, They had her using the restroom and they had taped a newspaper in her hand as if she were reading the Atlanta Constitution. When we all went to bed we all went into our sisters room across the hall so we could hear what was going on. When one went to go into the restroom we heard him say, "Oh excuse me," and they walked back into the living room. While they were in the living room my brother took her out of the bathroom and put her in my sister's closet until the next day. After giving the person enough time they went back to their room and knocked before they entered to see if someone was in the room.

The next night they put her in the bed with her blond hair spread all over the pillow like she was asleep. The light was turned on in the bathroom and the door was left ajar so that the light would shine toward the bed and they could see the person in the bed. Again they excused themselves and decided to sleep one on the couch and one in the chair for the night. As they were getting ready to go to sleep in the living room they heard them moving Matilda out of the bedroom into my sister's bedroom. Thankfully for us the got up and went to bed in their bedroom for the night.

The next morning we just knew that we were going to get it from them and the our parents. When everything went off as normal we were left to wonder when the other foot was going to drop.

We had to wait until we got ready to go to bed the next night. When we went to our separate rooms and pulled back our covers we went to jump into the bed and we could only slide in half way in. We had made the beds the previous mornings and they were made the same way we had made beds for years and never had any problems. My brother said this is the other foot dropping. Just sleep under the cover that you can get under and they will be listening to us, hear us as we grumble that we can't get into our beds.

Meanwhile downstairs my sisters tried to get in their beds and they to could only get in half way and their feet wouldn't go any farther into the bed. They took all of their covers off to see what was wrong with their bed covers and then they found out what was wrong. Someone had remade the bed and as you pulled down the bed covers it looked normal. When they remade the bed they took the top sheet and folded it in half and tucked the part for the bottom of the bed into the top of the bed like it was folded in half and when you went to pull the covers back you could only slide in on the sheet half way. If you just pulled the spread and blanket back and not the sheet you could get in the bed as usual.

At breakfast the next morning we each got a wink from the brother workers and we knew then that they had caught on and the joke was back on us.

We later learned that they call this technique: A Short Sheeted Bed.

Yes, you probably already guessed, we passed this trick on to others as they came to visit and when we went visiting we always offered to make the beds with fresh sheets so that we could pass on what we had learned.