“Damon!”

“DAMON!”

Nine year old Damon went running into his mom’s room. He flicked on the bedroom light which momentarily blinded and stunned his mom. Six year old Héléna followed behind her brother.

“Damon! It’s in here,” shrieked the mother of two. “It’s in my closet!”

The boy took his mom’s hand in both of his and stroked it.

“Shh,” he whispered as Héléna climbed onto the empty side of the bed and snuggled close to her mom, a look of concern on her young face.

“It’s ok,” Héléna added in a whisper.

Damon stayed with his mom for a minute and only left her side to investigate the closet once her breathing had calmed down some. He slowly opened the closet door and stuck his head in. After looking left and right, he pulled the light string and fully opened the door, showing the illuminated closet to his mom. Not one thing appeared amiss.

“Mom,” he sighed, walking back to the side of the bed. “There’s nothing in there. You know-”

His mom cut him off.

“I want Henrik!” sobbed the mother, clinging to her daughter.

“Mom,” Damon continued more sternly. “You know there is no such thing as monsters. You’re under a lot of stress right now. Work deadlines, worrying about dad being overseas… It’s a lot, I know. But you have to stop this. This is the third time in as many days that you’ve woken us up to the tale of monsters. We need our sleep. You need your sleep. Please Mom, stop this nonsense.”

The mother shook her head. “No! No, it’s real. I swear it! You two must believe me!”

Damon shook his head and sent his sister off to bed. As Héléna walked out of the room, she gave her mom a sympathetic look before disappearing down the dark hallway.

Pulling the covers up and gently pushing down on his mom’s shoulders, Damon looked her square in the eyes. “There’s no. Such. Thing. As. Monsters.” He stroked his mom’s hair as she settled her head on her pillow. “Now, repeat after me: There’s no such thing as monsters.”

She hesitated, then slowly repeated the words, each one coming out shakily. He made her do this several more times until she seemed reasonably calm. The words did little to comfort her though. She knew the truth. There was no way what she was seeing was fake. She’d been more stressed than this before and nothing as horrifying as seeing something inhuman ever happened.

With a small smile and a nod, Damon was satisfied she was fine. He gave her a kiss on the forehead, turned off the light, and gently shut the bedroom door before walking back to his room to get a few more hours of sleep.

The next morning was tense. It was the children that had to get their mom out of bed to get ready for the day. She hadn’t slept a wink for as soon as Damon’s bedroom door clicked shut, her closet door squeaked open again. Red eyes glared at her as she quivered in her bed. She didn’t blink. It didn’t blink. It was like that for hours. The closet door squeaked shut when it heard the kids’ alarm clocks going off.

The mother sat hunched over her cereal bowl as Damon and Héléna happily talked amongst themselves. They had to sternly tell her to finish eating and finish getting ready so she wouldn’t be late for work again.

Once she got to work, she couldn’t concentrate. She couldn’t wait any longer; she had to call her husband.

The phone rang countless times. She almost hung up until she heard a whisper on the other end.

“Ednaaa,” it said.

The mother drew in a quick breath. “Henrik?! Is that you?”

A throat cleared and the recognizable voice of her husband said, “Sorry Edna, is that you? It’s me, Henrik. Can you hear me?”

She let out a heavy breath. “Henrik. I’m sorry, I know I shouldn’t be calling you long-distance, but I’m so frightened! The kids won’t believe me, but… but there’s a monster in our room, Henrik. I swear there’s a monster. It watches me sleep. Sometimes it’s in the closet, but usually it’s under the bed. I can feel it. It moves the bed. The sheets ripple. I hear breathing. Oh, dear…” a sob cut her off.

Then silence. She pulled the phone away from her face to see if she had been disconnected. The screen still showed “Henrik” along with his smiling picture.

“Yeah… yes, I’m here, honey. And I believe you.”

A breath caught in her throat. “You, you do?”

Henrik’s voice became hushed. “Yes, I’ve seen it too. I saw it the night before I left. I thought it was the sleeping pill playing tricks on me. I was stressed about flying, so I took one and figured it messed with my head a little. But when I woke up, there were some tears on my pajama pant legs that I couldn’t explain! Edna, please, get out-”

The call dropped.

Edna tried to call her husband back, but kept getting a busy signal.

That night at dinner, Edna made a proposal to her children: “Let’s go stay at my brother’s until dad comes home in two days. I think we’ll all feel better there.”
The two kids exchanged glances.

“They have five kids over there…” Damon began.

“And three hyper dogs,” Héléna added.

“Do you really think that’ll be better?” Damon asked.

Edna chewed the inside of her cheek. “Well… Yes, b-because… they have that nice room at the end of the hall that’s all by itself. We won’t hear anything down there. Besides, your uncle will make sure everyone’s quiet for us.”

Damon gripped his fork and stared down at his food with furrowed brows.

Edna’s own hands began to perspire.

“We are not leaving this house because you think there’s a monster in your closet.”

She pleaded with her son: “It’s not just in my closet! It’s under-”

“Nope!” Damon interjected, slamming his fist with the fork down hard on the table. “No, mom, there’s nothing there. You need to knock this off and forget about it!”

Edna twisted her napkin under the table. She knew her brother wouldn’t have them anyway since he had his own stresses to deal with at the moment.

“What if we…” Edna began, but saw both kids shaking their heads.

Edna tucked her children into their beds, Damon first followed by Héléna. At Héléna’s bedside, she crouched down and whispered, “Can I sleep with you for a while?”

Héléna looked at her door, thinking about what Damon might say. She felt sorry for her mom though, so she nodded and scooted over in her full size bed. Edna squeezed in and silently thanked her with a smile and kiss on the cheek. She already felt safer.

The night was going smoothly until she heard a knock on the door. Her eyes sprang open. The moonlight shining through the sheer curtains showed her daughter was still asleep.

The knock came again.

Edna nudged her daughter’s shoulder, but it didn’t stir her.

There were two loud bangs on the door.

Edna screamed.

Héléna finally woke.

“Héléna! Something’s at the door!”

Héléna looked at her mom in a daze, then crawled out of bed and opened her door without hesitation.

A black hallway.

Héléna flipped the switch next to her door to turn on her bedroom light.

There was a figure now in front of her door.

Edna clutched her chest with both hands. Staring back at her was…

Damon.

He had a tired, angry look on his face. He walked past his sister, straight to his mom. He reached out his hand and she instinctively took it. Damon guided her to her own bed.

In bed, she quietly began to cry. Damon relaxed his face and smiled at her.

“I know you can do this,” he encouraged her. “One more night and then dad will be home to show you there’s nothing here. You’ll feel so much better then!”

She shook her head, “But he said he believes me!”

Damon shook his head slowly. “No… I think he was just trying to make you feel better. So listen, I’ll sit with you until you fall asleep. Will that make you feel better?”

Edna dumbly shook her head, only absorbing a few words he said.

Damon was true to his word and stayed until soft snores came from his mom’s parted lips. After that, he left to check on Héléna, then went back to sleep in the comfort of his own bed.

It was four in the morning when Edna awoke for seemingly no reason at all. She hadn’t been dreaming. She hadn’t felt the urge to use the bathroom. She just woke up.

Her eyes darted around the room and caught sight of nothing but the glow of the clock across from the foot of the bed. She lay there, forcing panic to stay down and not get the best of her.

In her head she repeated the mantra, “There’s no such thing as monsters.”

That is, until the sheets and cover began to tighten around her chest and midsection. It was slow at first, then sudden. She gasped for breath. A bony hand clasped over her mouth. A hiss and growl rose from the side of her bed. There they were again – the two red hot eyes, without pupils, somehow glowing in the pitch-black room. The thing growled again. There was a wet noise, like the thing had opened its mouth. Something damp and spongy lapped at her cheek. She tried to scream, and that only tightened the grip around her mouth.

Edna tried to kick the covers loose, and her arms struggled beneath the tight sheets. There was a loud snap and she was still. The thing – the monster – dragged her under the bed and disappeared with its prey.

The children slept on.