“Mommy,” I whispered. “I think there is a monster under my bed. Can you go scare it away for me?”
“I already told you that monsters aren’t real. It’s too late for this. Go back to bed,” Mommy said.
I looked next to her on the bed, the spot next to her empty, seemingly for a long time.
“Where is Daddy? I’ll go asked Daddy.”
“Daddy isn’t home right now. Go back to sleep,” Mommy said.
I crept through the hallway back to my room, my hands brushing the wall to make sure that I wouldn’t bump into something. I kept looking behind me, as if the shadows that were lurking in the night were crawling behind me and were ready to pounce on me at any moment. I made it back to my room, and I stared at my bed. I took a deep breath. I was ready. I was going to confront the monster myself. I got on my hands and knees and crawled to my bed. I slowly lowered my head beneath the bed. I saw two glowing eyes staring back at me. A little boy crawled out from under my bed. He was covered in shadows, yet his features were still very apparent. He looked as if he could be my twin brother.
“Hi,” he murmured to me in a genuine tone. “Are they done yelling?”
“Who are you talking about? It’s too late for yelling. Everyone is asleep,” I said.
“Mommy and Daddy. They were yelling about my grades. My teacher said that the school wants to put me in special classes for my reading skills. Mommy wants to get me a tutor and put me in special classes. Daddy said we didn’t have the money. Daddy doesn’t think I’m stupid,” the little boy said, a grin on his face.
“My mommy and daddy yell all the time too,” I said. “I like to ignore it. I know they love each other and that they love me.”
The little boy sighed. “I say that too. Whenever I hear them screaming, I just hide under the bed. It’s safer under there. The shadows don’t scream; the shadows don’t hurt you. One day you should try coming under here with me.”
“Okay. Maybe I will.”
The little boy yawned. He scratched his head and began to crawl back under the bed.
“Where are you going?” I asked.
“I have to go now. Maybe we’ll see each other again,” the little boy said as he disappeared into the shadows under my bed.
I lifted myself up and sat on my floor. I wondered if I would be friends with the little boy. We had so much in common, and he seemed so kind. Then, I heard a rustle that sounded like it was coming from behind my dresser. Smoke billowed from behind my dresser. In a little gap, another boy crawled out, who seemed to be slightly older than me, maybe by two or three years. He held a lit cigarette in one hand and had a devilish grin on his face. His lips seemed chapped, and a little cut went across his bottom lip. Above the grin were his eyes, light blue and gleaming with a sense of adventure, which were exactly like mine. One eye was surrounded by a greyish, blue circle, which seemed to cause that eye to squint.
“Want to try my cigarette?” the boy asked as he giggled at me.
“Where did you get that from? My daddy doesn’t let me near those. He smokes them all the time. He says they’re a grown-up treat.”
The boy giggled some more. “I stole a pack from Daddy when he was passed out on the couch. He couldn’t find them when he woke up and got really angry.”
“Is that how you got that?” I asked as I pointed at his face, motioning towards the darkened circle around his eye.
“Yeah. Daddy hits me sometimes, but I know he still loves me. How’d you guess?” the boy said.
“My daddy hits my mommy sometimes, but he still loves both of us too,” I said.
“Yeah, Daddy would never leave me,” the boy said as he crawled back behind the dresser.
“Wait, where are you going?” I questioned.
“I have to go now,” the boy said, his voice fading into the shadows that engulfed the back of the dresser.
I stood up. I was ready to go to sleep. It was late. I looked at my clock, and it read 2:48 a.m. I walked towards my bed and noticed my stuffed penguin was lying on the floor near my closet. As I walked towards my closet to pick up my penguin, I noticed a teenage boy was lying in the closet. He had headphones on and appeared to be bouncing his head to the beat of a song. I walked over to him and bent down. I tapped him on the shoulder. He opened his eyes and lowered his headphones.
“Hey, kid. What’s up?” the teenage boy said.
“Hi. What are you doing in my closet?” I asked.
“Oh. Nothing really. Just listening to music. I like to come here to escape from reality,” he stated.
“Escape from reality?”
“Yeah. When you get older, kid, you’ll understand,” the teenage boy said, a frown forming on his face.
I was confused. Why would someone want to sit alone in a closet? Why was he not with his friends or his mommy or daddy? I noticed the marks on his arm. I got excited.
“Is that a tattoo?” I pointed to the marks on his arm. “I always wanted a tattoo!”
“Oh. I guess that’s one way to describe them,” the teenage boy said.
“What do you mean?”
“Well, you see, when I get really upset, I need a way to take away the pain and the anger. So, I mark up my arm with my pens,” the teenage boy said, rubbing the marks on his arm.
“Well, doesn’t that hurt?” I asked.
“At first it did, but eventually, I got used to the pain. You always get used to the pain, kid.”
“Well, why don’t you talk to your mommy or daddy about it?”
The teenage boy looked away, tears welling in his eyes. “Dad left a few years back and never came back. Mom is too busy. She already has to work three jobs just to keep a roof above our heads and food on the table. Neither of them would care or understand anyway”
“My mommy and daddy would never leave me. They love me too much.”
“Yeah, kid. I bet they do. I bet they do,” the teenage boy muttered to himself as he started to cough.
“Are you sick?”
“No, kid, I’m not sick.”
“Then why are you coughing?”
“It’s how I lessen the pain. It helps quiet the voices in my head. The cough is just a small price to pay for peace,” the teenage boy uttered.
“What causes it?”
“Cigarettes. You’ll learn about them when you are older. You won’t listen to all the people who tell you not to use them. You’ll use them anyway. I wish you wouldn’t. I wish you would never touch those substances. Yet, you still will,” the teenage boy said, seemingly pleading.
“I won’t, I promise, but why are you so scared?”
The teenage boy sighed. “Because cigarettes are addictive. They ruined my life, but I don’t have anything else. I don’t have anything to live for. They are all I have.”
“I won’t do that. I will never hurt myself.”
The teenage boy ignored my statement. He looked past me towards my clock. “Kid, it’s time for you to go to bed. It’s 3:35 in the morning.”
“Wait!” I exclaimed, but it was too late. The teenage boy closed the closet door and disappeared into the shadows.
I climbed into bed with my stuffed penguin and snuggled in my sheets. I pulled the penguin close to my chest, along with the tiny blanket I had had since I was a baby. I giggled at how much I had outgrown the blanket, and I sighed. I had met such nice children; they were not monsters at all. I faded into a state of sleep, dreaming of the children I had met, wondering who the broken children were.
I later learned that those children were me, all at different stages of my life. But it was too late. I was seventeen and already six feet underground.
