One
Three weeks to the day Primrose’s older brother, Thomas,
had gone missing. No one could understand what had
happened to him. One morning as Primrose was getting
ready for school she heard her mother cry out for her father.
When Primrose went to investigate, she found them in
Thomas’s room, his window open, his bedsheets ruffled but
he wasn’t there. The police came but did not find anything
conclusive about what had happened. It looked as if he had
just vanished. Primrose watched officers fill her house and
the usually quiet village street was now bustling. Her
neighbours were out updating each other on the gossip. The
next day search parties made up of volunteers went out to
look for him. There was no trace of him. Primrose joined
the searches and each time she went out she counted less
and less people. All the people that were left had lost their
motivation, their hope that someone in the group would find
even a slither of evidence that Thomas had been there. She
didn’t. She was persistent on going out to look every day but
eventually her parents did not want her to go out, not even
to school and then she was stopped from playing in the
village with her classmates. Weeks passed and rumours had
spread that Thomas had simply run away from home but
Primrose along with her mother and father did not believe
it. She understood that life for her family had changed as her
parents became strangers to themselves and her. Even at
nine years old she was extremely observant. Her mother was
always either crying or sleeping. The doctor gave her pills to
help her sleep for hours at a time. Not always at night. But
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her father, he grew cold and never had a smile for anyone,
even her. She too was sad, she loved her brother and missed
him dearly but under the surface, she couldn’t understand
her parents’ reaction. She too wanted her brother to return
but she wanted to do something about it. Her parents didn’t
seem to have the fight to do so. She wanted to help her
parents but simply did not know how. Primrose had faded
into the background like she was just a piece of furniture in
the house. Her parents did not show her any malice but
instead, their grief blinded them to her. She felt that she had
become displaced in her own home. Since she was no longer
allowed out of the house she took it upon herself to take
care of her parents. Primrose began to make sure her mother
ate, even if it was just one slice of buttered toast every
morning. She began to make sure that she kept the noise
down when her father was watching television or reading the
daily newspaper as he became easily angry. Another aspect
that she wasn’t familiar with. For the rest of her day, Primrose
would sit at her window and watch the neighbours in the village
leave flowers and candles at the garden gate. They would stand
outside, shake their heads and talk about her family. They did
not hide this fact, they would regularly point to the house and
even Thomas’s window. Some of them left fresh home-cooked
food at the front step. Her parents didn’t seem to notice so
primrose would have to retrieve them before the animals got to
it. She would make herself dinner and make sure the washing
was done. Thankfully the neighbours’ gifted food was all
cooked and she knew how to use a microwave.
The months went by and the police were not coming to the
house as often. There wasn’t any news on Thomas. They
would phone every so often to let the family know they were
still investigating. The flowers were withering on the gate
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and the candles had melted away. No more food was left at
the door for them. Primrose had returned to school. It was
never a place of acceptance or joy for her to go to. She would
find herself alone a lot of the time. Not a great focus for
teachers or pupils. That changed when she walked through
the doors after Thomas’s disappearance. No one spoke to
her personally, but she saw their looks and heard their
whisperings. She became the focal point, and she did not care
for it. Primrose couldn’t focus at school and eventually asked
her father if she could stay at home from now on. Her father
said it is something that she has to get used to. Primrose’s father
had started to return to some of his normal parenting duties
once Primrose had returned to school, such as food shopping,
cleaning, and preparing meals. The only difference to Primrose
was that her father had not found his smile yet. He never spoke
to her or read to her anymore. Now he slept on the sofa while
her mother never left her bed upstairs. All under one roof but
no longer in the same family Primrose would think to herself.
On one stormy night, Primrose made her way to bed and
picked up where her father had left off reading the book
about a boy wizard. She curled up under her duvet with a
bedside lamp shining on the printed words. Her imagination
flew as she read. In the silence of her room, she heard
something roll across her floor when in the corner of her
eye she saw a small yellow ball rolled out from under her
bed. She watched it stop as it hit the rug in the middle of her
room. She got out from her duvet, studied it and when
seeing that there was nothing odd about it she put it back
underneath her bed. As she tried to re-immerse herself in her
book she saw the same ball roll along her floor again. Making
sure she kept her place in the book, she got out of bed once
more but instead of putting the ball back like before she
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decided to kick it under her bed. The moment the ball went
under the sheet it rolled back to where she stood. Primrose
could not believe it. She did this again and again and every time
the ball flew out from under the bed faster and faster. Full of
curiosity she pulled back the sheet and was instantly taken aback
by what she found. She did not scream for she was not afraid,
but she was frozen, staring at the culprit.
She had never seen a creature like it before. A smooth black and
white face centred by enormous piercing metallic eyes. The
creature’s eyes and head shape were similar to humans,
though bigger and with no indication of a nose or a mouth.
The creature did not move or flinch. They both stared at
each other. Taking in each other’s faces. Primrose then
brought herself to whisper “hello?” but the creature merely
tilted its head. “Do you understand me?” she asked. The
creature nodded.
Primrose didn’t know what to do. She was excited and
instantly wanted to go tell her parents, but she couldn’t. She
knew she couldn’t. They had enough to think about, never
mind a peculiar creature under their daughter’s bed, she
thought to herself. Since her brother’s disappearance, she
had no friends she could confide in. She thought it best to
ask it some yes or no questions to help understand what and
where the creature had come from.
“Are you hurt?” The creature shook its head.
“Are you here to hurt me?” Primrose was not sure if the
creature could lie but she wanted to ask anyway. The creature
shook its head again. “That’s good,” Primrose said, smiling at
the creature “are you hungry?” she asked. The creature only
blinked in response. “Why don’t you come out from under
there and I’ll get some food.”
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Primrose didn’t wait for a response, she ran down the stairs
as quietly as she could, making sure to not wake up her father
who was lying asleep on the sofa. Climbing on the counter,
she went to the biscuit tin. She also got a glass of milk and
ran back up the stairs. The creature had not gotten out from
under the bed like she had hoped so she put the treats down
on the floor and lifted the sheet again. The creature was still
there, watching her. Primrose then saw that the creature had
brought its arms round to the front. It had long black fingers
with sharp nails, the black hands merging into its white arms
like veins.
“I brought up some Battenburg. my favourite. Oh. I’m
sorry,” as Primrose passed the cake over she remembered
she couldn’t see a mouth on the creature. Placing the
Battenberg on the floor, she pondered on what to say next.
She hoped she hadn’t offended them. The creature slowly
lifted its hand and with two of its long fingers took the
Battenberg. It brought it up to the centre of its face and two
small holes appeared as it took a deep sniff of the treat. The
creature’s eyes grew in delight and a mouth appeared.
Another hole in the middle of its face. A perfect circle which
sucked in the cake. Primrose began to laugh. She couldn’t
help herself. The creature’s face went back to being smooth.
Primrose was trying hard to stop laughing by covering her
mouth. She did not want the creature to think that she was
making fun of them. She was taken aback and had never seen
anything eat like that. No animal she had ever seen on television
did that. She knew she had to stop laughing so she didn’t wake
her parents. The creature took out its hand again and stretched
its fingers out towards her. She stopped laughing immediately.
It took its long fingers and wrapped them around her hand.
Primrose was about to pull away when she heard a voice. It was
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smooth, soft, and tender. “Thank you” it said. It was then that
Primrose realised the voice she heard in her head was coming
from the creature, for the creature’s mouth had not returned on
their face. She smiled with delight and tightened her grip on
its hand. “My name is Primrose. What’s yours?” The creature
was hesitant to reply but answered “Adatiel.” Primrose
repeated the name slowly, making sure she got the
pronunciation correct.
“I don’t want to be rude, but can I ask… what are you? I’ve
never seen anything like you before,” Primrose asked. Abatiel
studied her again. They felt they could trust her with this
information. “I am a demon.” “A demon. Like from religion?”
Primrose asked. “Not really. We existed long before religion
but when some humans saw us they adopted us to symbolise
some of their ‘sins’” - Abatiel did not sound pleased. “I’m
sorry. I find that people are scared of things they don’t
understand.” Primrose tried to reassure them.
Abatiel knew with her answer that they had made the right
decision to trust her. The two spent most of that night lying on
the floor and holding hands so they could speak to each other.
Primrose found herself telling Adatiel everything about herself
and all the things that had happened with her brother but after
a short while she quickly changed the conversation. She did
not want to bore them. She was desperate to know more.
Unfortunately, Abatiel did not say much about where they came
from and just when Primrose was about to ask more questions,
she heard her father come up the stairs. She darted to her bed
and pretended to be asleep. She had only a couple of seconds
to choose a position and the one she ended up with was not
very comfortable. Her father came in and gently picked her up.
He placed her under her sheets and tucked her in. Turning off
her bedside lamp and kissing her on her forehead, he then took
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her book and placed it on the bookshelf. Once Primrose heard
her father go back downstairs, she checked under her bed but
Adatiel was gone. She lay back and stared at the ceiling. She
pondered on what had just happened. Not only with the
creature under her bed but also about her father. Did he
always do that and she had never noticed? But her eyes were
heavy and tired and eventually she could not fight it any longer,
she fell asleep and dreamed about her new friend who visited
her from under her bed.