your mommy and daddy killed too?”
Francis was weeping heavily now. He closed his eyes, and screamed inside his head, “not real, not real, not real,” over and over. His eyes stayed clamped shut for a moment as he sat there on his floor, shaking in the corner, and then his eyes fluttered open again while he still repeated the words: not real, not real . . .
And before anything in the darkness could even swirl into his vision, the hissing snapped, “But I am real, Francis!” as if he could read the boys mind.
The creatures white boney face seemed to hover in the darkness. Its black clothing could hardly be seen, and now that Francis had broken into tears of fear, his clear vision blurred, his head pounded, and the smell of death brewed inside his nostrils.
“You’re time is up, Francis, boy! I’ve come for your flesh!”
“No, no, no!” Francis pleaded. ‘You’re not real!”
“I am real, boy. I’m just as real as you! Bessssssides, could a figment of your imaginations do thisssss?”
Out from the darkness—out from where its body should’ve been—a single object glimmered before the boy’s eyes from what little light that had scampered into the room from behind his blue bedroom drapes. It was a sharp metal claw.
“No!” Francis cried again, and flinched when the metal claw struck his thin pale skin. But it had not penetrated. It gently began to slide down the boy’s face. Drawing no blood, but sending a shrilling array of throbbing shivers leaping through his skin.
Goosebumps.
The claw retracted back into the cloth, and the beast rose once again. Its movements still mimicked that of a puppet being controlled by a master.
“I’m ssstarving!” it roared.
The boy looked up at the beast, still frightened, and stood. “You’re not real,” he said with a voice of pure confidence. Although the tears were still rolling and his hands still trembled.
The beast chuckled again, and when it cocked its head it sounded almost mechanical. “Sssstill not convinced? Well, I suppose you’ll find out in a moment, won’t you?”
The confidence had now drained from Francis. His eyes even wider than before, and this caused more tears to gush out. He clenched his gut as it turned in pain.
The boy goggled up at the beast, who lingered in the dark, preparing for the worst. This was going to be nasty, as it was in his horror western when the evil creatures came out of the sand storm with their fangs.
The only difference was that this monster—this thing—was a hundred times worse than Francis ever imagined the sand creatures were.
Something crackled from within the beast, and then it made a move that Francis wasn’t expecting. The creature's arms lurched upward striking the boy and he was thrown across the room. Francis toppled until he struck the wall with a nasty thud. Dazed, he turned to face the beast once more.
The sound the creature made next was the same sound he made when he first came in. That clicking sound. Whatever that sound was, it was the noise he made when it was feeding time.
“NO!” Francis howled. “NO, NO, NO!”
But it was no use. The beats was already looming over the small boy with its shoulders huddled, and Francis seen its claws sprawl out from its cloth-body. They were all similar to the claw he had felt on his cheek, only there were a good dozen of them now, and they looked even bigger.
“Yes,” the beast hissed, and it went in for the kill.
Francis cowered—but nothing happed.
Confused, Francis looked up to find that his vision no longer heeded the horrible place called darkness. The darkness had been killed by something that no monster could prevail against: The light.
It came as a shock to Francis at first. He had been in the dark for too long, and his eyes stung from crying. Everything was white and blurry, and acted as if it were a deep fog – a sinister haze of ghostly frost.
Over the ringing in his ear, he heard a voice—a familiar voice. It was his father's.
“Francis,” he heard the voice ring from across the room like a bell, but a very distant bell. What . . . going . . . on . . . everything . . . alright . . . where the only words he could make out after that, until his vision started to bounce back to its usual state, and the ghostly mist that had been his eyes adjusting from dark to light vanished. His father stood in the doorway across the room. Francis was on his knees with tears running down his cheeks and the taste of blood still dawdling in his mouth.
“Francis,” came the voice again.
“Huh?” The boy grumbled, though not as a response to his name, but purely out of confusion.
“What happened? Are you alright?”
Francis seen his father rushing to him now, and it was only then that he had realized that the monster—that horrible thing—was gone.
“I heard a loud thud,” his father said.
“There was a monster,” Francis’ bloodshot eyes were darting around the room.
His father bent down to his side. “Francis. There are no monsters. How many times do we have to tell you? It’s all in your head, bud.” His father used his index finger to tap the side of Francis’ noggin. He smiled at the boy, but the smile was not returned. Francis only shivered there on the floor with a look of consternation still sitting on his face.
“Come on,” he said, picking Francis up. “Let’s get you back to bed.”
“No!”
“You want a glass of milk, first?” He set Francis down on his bed.
“I don’t want to sleep alone.”
“Well, you’re a big boy now. You gotta start sleeping by yourself.”
“But, dad. There was a monster. Honest.”
His father shook his head. When he did, he looked down at the dresser and seen a book titled DYING YELLOW with a picture of a cowboy hat with blood on it half buried in the sand, sticking out with a scratch running across it.
“Is this what you’ve been reading?” He picked up the paperback and frowned. “You’re mother and I okay’d adventures and westerns. You shouldn’t be reading anything with blood in it. No wonder you’re having nightmares.”
“I’m not having nightmares!” Francis explained. “There really was a monster in here.”
His father set the book down and walked around to the other side of the bed where Francis now sat using the applesauce method. (The left over right tuck and slouch, as the kids at school called it).
His father sat down beside him. “I’ve got work in the morning, and I really need you to go to bed now. So I can go to bed, too.”
“But—”
“No monsters. They're not real.” He shook his head playfully. “Alright?”
Francis looked down, uncomfortably, still shaking a little; although he felt better now that his father was there with him. But that wasn’t going to last for very long, was it?
“We’ll leave your door open. We’re right down the hall, okay? But please, Francis, don’t wake me up unless you really need too.”
Leave the door open, he says . . . he knows nothing about monsters, Francis thought, and then almost asked his Father if he did. “You don’t know anything about monsters, do ya’ dad?” he could've asked, but that would only make his father angrier, because he didn’t believe in monsters to begin with.
Reluctantly, Francis shook his head.
“Good,” his father said, and stood up. He was about to say something else, too, probably goodnight, but he was stopped by a noise that came from behind the closed closet door behind him.
Francis’ eyes widened again, and the fear came rushing back so violently he almost lost control of his bladder. Oh no!
“What was that?” His father asked and turned.
“IT’S HIM, DAD! IT’S THE MONSTER!” Francis blurted out, unable to control himself.
“Not so loud, you’re mother’s still sleeping.” His father shushed him by placing his index over his lips and giving him the look.
Won’t matter, Francis thought. Once he eats us, he’ll eat her as well.
r /> His father took a few steps over to the closet door.
“No!” Francis whisper-yelled, keeping into consideration that his father had told him not to scream, although he wasn’t sure why that would matter if they were both dead. “Stop!”
His father placed his hand on the doorknob and began to turn.
“DON’T DO IT!”
But he did. He did do it; and Francis knew that the sound of the creaking closet door was music to the monster's ears.
Like the story?
I hope you did. If so, please consider writing a short and honest review. This is my first story I’ve published, so I am open to any feedback. Thanks for reading!
Thank you for reading books on BookFrom.Net Share this book with friends