An Interesting Child

The monster had been around for centuries. He was the thing you were afraid of when you lay in the dark trying to fall asleep. The monster under your bed. The monster in the closet. He had one goal in his continued existence: terrorizing the weakling creatures known as humans. Children were his preferred prey. Those tiny humans that screamed and cried when he did nothing more than open his wide, pale eyes. Their piteous screams gave him a savage pleasure. Hidden in the dark corners and spaces where humans feared to look, the monster ensnared his prey. Children all over the world for ages have dreaded becoming his next victim. Never had the monster met an exception to this fact.

It was time to move on. The monster had become bored with these humans. The creepy creature crept from room to room in the run-down house. Traveling by night, the dark shadows aided him in his journey. He never stayed in one place for too long. So many tiny humans to frighten, so little time. The two small children who took residence in this house would be relieved to see him go. As would the bigger humans that came running when they heard their precious children moaning. This place had been his haunting ground for far too long. A new territory would surely cure his insufferable boredom.

There was only one child in the new human habitat the monster next deigned to enter. The boy was sleeping. Upon entering the child's room, the monster slipped like a shadow into the space under the bed. The boy continued to sleep like a log. As the sun started climbing past the horizon, flooding the small town with red-orange light, the creature under the bed planned his attack. First impressions, after all, were important.

The monster slunk out from under the bed, watching as the child woke up slowly. The small boy blinked his eyes open. The small boy stared at the towering, black shadow with pale eyes and yellow claws. The small boy said "hello."

A wave of shock swept over the ages old creature and for a minute he was baffled. The child wasn't screaming. He wasn't even trembling in fear as all other tiny humans are wont to do when in his presence. The boy couldn't have seen more than five winters and yet he looked at the terrifying monster with nothing more than mild interest.

"I'm John." The boy stated in a matter-of-fact voice. He felt another wave of crippling shock. What was going on? This was not how the first encounter with a new child was supposed to go. The boy—John—was still staring at him his eyes wide with a child's curiosity. Bullying his mind into remembering how to communicate, the monster opened his mouth and responded in a menacing, baritone voice, baring his fangs: "Hello." This greeting was not meant to be friendly. The singular word served as a harbinger to the boy's doom. John, the boy, seemed amused. Too amused. He giggled shrilly, causing the monster to let loose a dismal sigh. This was not going well.

"What exactly do you find so humorous?" he asked, trying to bring control to the meeting. In response John covered his grin with his small hands to hide another effervescent burst of giggles. The utter ridiculousness of the situation bewildered the monster. Not knowing what else to do, he approached John's bed. The giggles stopped abruptly as the monster leaned over the boy. What made him different from every other child he had haunted? His wide, ancient eyes were just inches from John's deep, brown eyes. Without an inkling of fear, the boy gazed at the creature that had made grown men shriek like children.

"Why don't you scream?" the monster whispered. A chubby hand reached out and touched the monster's forehead. Mystified, he stepped back. John continued to stare at him.

"You're not scary." The boy whispered back. Then his brown eyes sparkled with glee, "Your voice sounds funny."

As the child guffawed again the monster narrowed his eyes at the strange creature trying to trick him into believing it was a tiny human. The laughter subsided and John's eyes rested once more on the tall, dark stranger that had invaded his home.

"Who are you?"

Ah. Now the introductions. If he couldn't even make this child of five recoil in fright he was clearly losing his touch. "I have no name. I have no home." He said impatiently, "I exist to scare tiny humans like you."

This statement did not perturb John in the slightest. He bounced up and down slightly on his bed, still tangled in his blankets. "Are you gonna try and scare me?" he said eagerly.

"That is the goal, little one." Vaguely amused now, the monster watched as John prepared himself to be scared. He gazed at the creature expectantly. The monster narrowed his eyes at the child. This reaction was very strange indeed.

With no warning, he allowed his form to expand, filling the room with a pitch-black darkness. His shadowy form even diminished the light of the rising sun. The room became tomb-like. He could hear John's teeth chattering as the cold permeating throughout his bedroom set deep into his bones. The monster held his expanded form for a minute or two, then when he was satisfied he allowed himself shrink back into a solitary shadow. The room brightened, the warmth returned. John's face was pale but as the monster watched for a reaction in the child his cheeks flushed.

"T-that…" the monster smirked, waiting for the delightful screams to start at long last. "That was amazing. You're amazing!"

Curse this impossible child. He needed something bigger. John still looked awestruck and amazed. The monster sneered at him unpleasantly but the child was still unaffected. His sneer made John stick out his tongue in defiance. Very well. He asked for it. The monster's form dissipated at his command. He didn't often use invisibility in his scaring tactics. He much preferred allowing his victim to see the being that was terrorizing them. This ensured his place of honor in their nightmares. But unique methods were needed for a unique child, and John was, he had to admit, unique.

The monster launched himself to the opposite side of John's room. A wind gust followed his movements and swept John's already sleep-tousled hair away from his face. An evil smirk on his face, the monster swirled up a tornado of wind in the middle of the boy's room. He rattled the posts of John's bed and tore down the curtains. High winds knocked books off the bookshelves and threw furniture haphazardly. The monster slowed his flight and grinned maliciously at the wreck that used to be a little boy's room.

Looking at the overturned furniture he realized that he hadn't been trying to keep the noise down. John's parents must be deep sleepers. Speaking of John… now that he had revealed his power over the elements the boy must be well and truly scared.

"Well, little one? How was that?" It was rather like a game now. The monster was having fun. John was a very interesting child. He found that he wouldn't mind to much if John wasn't scared this time. No fear meant bigger tactics and the monster was ready to bring in the big guns. John hadn't answered. There was complete silence. The monster looked at the boy's bed. He saw that it was overturned like the rest of the furniture. It did not immediately register with the monster that John had been on top of the bed before his manufactured windstorm. The monster blinked in confusion. Then the bed shifted. A little hand reached out of the side and pushed at the side of the bed. The monster froze. John was trapped under his bed. John didn't even scream when his bed flipped under him taking him with it! The monster felt fear for the first time in his existence and he flung himself toward the injured boy.

"John? Talk to me, John." Frantically he picked John's bed off the ground, hearing a quiet groan as he did so. The monster's superhuman strength got away from him as he looked at John's crumpled form and he propelled the bed across the room. The boy was dazed and had a cut on his head that was leaking a red liquid. The monster had never seen blood before. Unknown emotions tore through the monster's chest. A sickening feeling of guilt weighed him down like a stone. Remorse caused his previously nonexistent heart to twinge in pain. John's injuries were his fault. He had never hurt a child physically before.

"Ow…" John muttered. The monster scooped the child into his usually formless arms and examined him closely. John eyes were shut tightly and the mirth and adoration that had adorned his small face was replaced by pain and shock. The monster found himself stammering half-formed apologies; words he had never said before were pouring out of his mouth. "Alright? Are you alright? It's okay, little one. You will be fine. I will clean up your room. It's the least I can do after all, I'm terribly sorry…"

Now he was babbling complete nonsense. He dragged John's bed back to its proper place with John still held tightly in his arms. The child was leaning into him trustingly, though the monster had done nothing to deserve his trust. He carefully placed John back on his bed and started restoring his room. The monster felt John's eyes on him as he put the books back on the bookshelf. It was certainly a peculiar sight, the centuries old monster busying himself with cleaning a child's room.

The monster tried to take steadying breaths. Why was he feeling such complicated emotions? The heartless being had developed a heart just because a boy had called him amazing and stared at him in awe. This boy had turned a suave, Satan-like creature into an awkward and fumbling mess just by not being afraid as had been the pattern for centuries. This would not do. Sentiment was a weakness and the monster would never be mistaken for feeling it. And yet, John was smiling at him again: a bemused smile that somehow made the boy look even younger.

John's room was put back to normal. John now looked at him like an inquisitive puppy; his head was cocked to the left and his eyes were bright.

"Thank you." He said. "That was pretty scary! I know I didn't scream like—like you wanted me to but that was just because—because, well, I was under my bed." He ended his speech with a nervous laugh. "It really did scare me, honest!" John said bracingly when the silence stretched.

The monster found himself smiling. Now this fascinating child was trying to comfort him. "Perhaps my efforts in scaring you were a tad extreme." John giggled at that, and the monster felt yet another foreign emotion bloom in his chest. He thought it might be happiness. The monster's smile grew. "It's alright that you didn't scream, little one. I think I prefer hearing you laugh."

John beamed at him.

7

An Interesting Child