“Bedbug! Bedbug!” shouted the little boy.

“That’s just Norman’s way of saying he doesn’t want to go to bed,” his mother, Mrs. Brocken, explained to the babysitter.

“Bedbug!” Norman said again.

“He’s been saying that ever since the other night,” said Mrs. Brocken. “My husband told him, ‘Good night, sleep tight, don’t let the bedbugs bite.’”

“Bite! Bite!” said Norman.

“You can ignore him, Cleo,” Mrs. Brocken said. “Put him to bed right at eight o’clock.”

Norman sobbed.

Cleo Henderson babysat for all the families in the neighborhood. This was the first time she had been hired by the Brockens.

Norman was cute. He had curly red hair and bright-blue eyes. But now his eyes were filling up with tears. Baby tears. And Cleo hated baby tears. She felt helpless whenever she saw them. She knew that being the babysitter meant that she was in charge. But baby tears always got to her.

“Maybe we can stay up and read a story if he has trouble sleeping?” asked Cleo, looking at Mrs. Brocken.

“Bedtime is eight o’clock,” said Mrs. Brocken firmly. She stepped into her fancy shoes and checked her hair in the hallway mirror. Then Mr. Brocken came down the stairs. He was wearing a nice suit and tie.

Mr. Brocken looked at his crying child. “Don’t tell me,” he said. “Bedbugs?”

“I don’t know why you ever said that to him,” said Mrs. Brocken.

“Everybody says it,” snapped Mr. Brocken. “It doesn’t mean anything.”

“Bedbug! Bedbug!” yelled the red-faced Norman.

“Does he think there are real bugs in his bed?” asked Cleo. She could understand Norman’s terror if he had seen an actual bug in his bed. Cleo hated bugs, too. She hated all creepy-crawly things.

“Who knows what’s going on in his little brain,” Mrs. Brocken said, picking up her purse.

“Bite! Bite!” screamed Norman.

Mr. Brocken threw up his arms. “That’s enough, Norman!” he shouted.

Both Cleo and Norman were surprised. Norman even stopped crying.

“I’m going up there right now to prove that there are no — I repeat no — bedbugs!” Mr. Brocken continued. “And then you are going to bed!” He angrily marched up the stairs, and Cleo heard a door bang shut.

The house was totally quiet. Then Mrs. Brocken said, “See, Norman? See what you’ve done? You made your daddy really mad and ruined —”

Suddenly, a terrible scream came from upstairs. It came from Norman’s room.

Mrs. Brocken raced upstairs, followed closely by Cleo, who held onto Norman’s hand.

When they opened the bedroom door, they found Mr. Brocken lying quietly on Norman’s bed. He looked like he was fast asleep.

“What are you doing?” asked Mrs. Brocken. “Why did you scream?”

Mr. Brocken didn’t answer. He didn’t move.

But the pillow under his head moved. A hairy black arm, about seven feet long, crept out from under the pillow. Then a second arm reached out from the other side.

Two see-through wings, like giant tennis rackets, sprung up on either side of the mattress. The legs of the bed began to shake. A loud hum filled the air.

Cleo couldn’t look away from the horrible scene. Mrs. Brocken screamed. The giant bug was shaking so much now that Mr. Brocken’s shoes came off his feet and slid across the bug’s smooth, inky shell and down to the bedroom floor.

Then the wings flapped. The bedbug scurried over to the open bedroom window, put its long front feelers on the sill, and leaped into the air. The awful creature flew around the Brockens’ backyard. Mr. Brocken still lay quietly, as if glued to the bug’s back. With a loud buzz, the bug flew above the roof and was lost in the starry night sky.

“Bedbug! Bedbug!” said Norman.

Cleo hugged the little boy. He squirmed in her arms and pointed, but not at the window this time. He pointed toward a dark corner of the bedroom. Cleo saw five or six large white shapes, as round as basketballs, nestled in the corner.

They were eggs. And their shells were starting to crack.