The Mysterious Squeaking Sound

I just had to record this story here because it is one that I will likely tell over and over through the years...

One morning in April, I got into our van to take the kids to school. As we were driving down the road, I started hearing a squeaking sound by my left ear. It was pretty faint, but it was definitely audible. I turned down the radio and asked the kids if they could hear it. We all listened really hard, and suddenly, we heard a squeak come from the other side of the car. Everyone heard it, but none of us knew what on earth it could possibly be. For the next day or two, I heard the squeaking coming from several different places in the car. The squeaks came often, but not in a regular rhythm, so I was pretty sure it was something alive. I even took a video of the sound to ask my siblings.

What is the mysterious squeaking sound?

After two days, I started to get a bit freaked out. Some of the sounds were still coming from right next to my ear, and I just knew that something was going to jump out at me while I was driving, and I was going to crash the car. My mind went to all the possibilities that it could be... baby birds? mice? insects? None of them were good options, and I got to the point where I refused to drive the car any more until the problem was solved. Jonathon was a bit annoyed with me, but I was a complete mess and couldn't deal with it any longer. We looked up what to do if you suspected animals in your car. The internet advised to park it somewhere in the hot sun, and the animals would leave the car because it was too hot. We did that, but to no avail. The noises continued.

Next, we decided to google various sounds to see if any of them sounded like the squeaks coming from our car. We heard baby birds, which were close but not quite right. When we googled baby mice, a shiver ran down my spine, and I was pretty darn worried that it was the same sound. Just thinking about that possibility was pretty much my worst nightmare because I am terrified of mice. I hate them with a passion. Jonathon was pretty confident that mice didn't make that noise, but he didn't have any alternate suggestions.

Finally after much pestering, Jonathon agreed to go digging to see if he could find our pesky little visitor. He got his tools and began to dismantle the side of the car where the seatbelt attaches. It took a lot of work and some tricky maneuvering, but he was finally able to get the covering off. When we shined a flashlight in the hole, sure enough, there was a baby mouse. Gah! I squirmed and squealed and got the heck out of there while he disposed of it!

He tried to find the other two that we had heard, but it was impossible to dismantle the dashboard without breaking something. When we consulted my brother, who had a similar problem last year, he said it would cost several hundred dollars to have a mechanic try to get them out. We were just going to have to let them die in there and hope that it didn't smell terrible when they did. I didn't drive the car for a few more days, and finally the sounds ceased. Thank heavens it never did smell bad. Jonathon figures that they were so small and the weather was still chilly enough that we never had to deal with the rotting stench. Even now I am having mini convulsions just thinking about it.

Our only thought is that the kids left the van door open one night and a mother mouse got in and had babies in the ceiling of the car. The mom probably left when we parked the car in the sun, and the babies fell from the ceiling down the various sides of the car; One in the seatbelt area, one in the passenger door, and one in the dashboard. It was quite a disturbing experience, but luckily, we are no worse off for it. Except maybe a little paranoid of mysterious squeaks.