Monsters

There is no monster under Lila’s bed. Of course, that is not possible. For everyone has a monster under their bed. Some are furry, or spiky, or slimy, or bumpy. Some are blue, or black, or green, or purple. Some have tails, some have wings, and some have claws. But Lila has no such thing. For when she looks under her bed, all she sees is dust, and crumbs, and one singular sock.

Lila turned eight years old exactly five months and twenty-seven days ago. Since her birthday, she had endured approximately three nightmares every night.

Lila did not know for certain what a nightmare was before her eighth birthday. Of course, she had heard about the awful things, but knowing and experiencing were drastically different.

Her parents had warned her how truly terrible they could be, but they were hopeful her monster would come early in her eighth year. In fact, they were almost certain one would nest by the second month. For they had both found monsters shortly after their eighth birthday.

A month or two of nightmares was not too bad, they had told Lila. It was easy when you knew you would never have a bad dream again once your monster was there. For everyone knows monsters love feasting on nightmares.

Monsters also liked gummy bears and lemonade, so Lila had been told. So, for the forty-sixth night in a row, Lila oh so gently laid a bowl of squishy candy underneath her bed, and oh so carefully slid a very full glass of sugary liquid right next to it.

She was trying green gummy bears tonight. Only green gummy bears. For Lila had tried all the gummy bears together, and that hadn’t worked. So, then she tried just the red gummy bears. Then just the yellow gummy bears. Then orange, and blue, and pink, and so on and so on. But still no monster lay under her bed.

Lila felt different about tonight, though. Surely green would work. Maybe she’d even get a green monster. One with scales and beady eyes and a long snout. And it would gobble up every bad dream that floated into Lila’s room. And for once in her eighth year, she would truly rest.

###

Three months and 9 days after Paige’s eighth birthday, she saw a monster under her bed. It was covered in red feathers and coiled up like a snake when the lights went out.

One month and twenty-one days after Heather’s eighth birthday, she heard a growl under her bed. It was so loud that the whole house shook.

Two days after Milo’s birthday, he awoke to a despicable smell. He told the whole class it was even worse than Jordan’s shoes.

9 months and thirteen days after her eighth birthday, Lila stopped leaving gummy bears under her bed.

There was no point, you see. Monsters seemed to like candy just about as much as they liked Lila. And they didn’t like her much at all, it turns out.

Lila couldn’t help but worry.

She worried when she laid her head on her pillow at night, for still there was nothing to keep away her unpleasant dreams.

She worried when she woke up, for she had to stare at her cereal as she told her parents there was nothing under her bed.

She worried when she went to school, for the kids in her class had begun whispering about her as she walked by. Not nasty things, not yet. But suspicious things. Childish guesses at something deemed odd.

One particular afternoon at recess, Lila ran into a group of girls. Not just ordinary girls, of course, but girls deemed important by the unspoken counsel of elementary school. Such standing came with the right to declare their judgment on all odd things. Which indeed included Lila.

“You’re lying,” one of the important girls said. “We all know you’re just doing it for attention.”

“Yeah, there’s like no way she hasn’t gotten a monster yet. I bet she just wants everyone to feel bad for her,” another important girl replied.

Lila cried that night. But there was nothing in her room to hear her.

###

The night before Lila’s ninth birthday, she did not sleep.

She had a few things to say to her monster. That is, if it showed up. But it had to show up, Lila thought. No one in the history of the world had gone into their ninth year without a monster. She wasn’t any different.

She just had a rude, lazy, entitled creature who couldn’t tell time. Oh, how the letter she had lying on her nightstand would be proclaimed in her biggest big-girl voice, like her mother used when Lila got put in time-out.

As she lay awake in her bed, Lila became madder and madder and madder. She hopped right up and began pacing her room, rereading her letter until her feet stomped and her face reddened and her hands trembled. She could have screamed. Instead, the girl plopped on the floor and could have cried.

But just then, she noticed something.

There was a spider crawling underneath her door. It was quite a large spider. Large enough that Lila could see its shadow across the room. Lila found that puzzling. But then, before her very eyes, the shadow grew. With each step of the spider's eight legs, the shadow grew closer, grew bigger, grew darker. As it neared Lila’s bed, she got a dreadful feeling. This was no monster. It was a nightmare.

“No,” Lila said in her biggest big-girl voice. Her hands still trembled.

The shadow paused, as if shocked. As if baffled to have been seen, to have been caught, to have been rejected.

“I said, NO.” Lila boomed as she stood up.

The shadow shuddered, like Lila had dropped a stone into its inky depths. But the ripples soon smoothed over, and the shadow resumed its pursuit toward the girl’s bed.

Lila knew what she had to do, for there was no monster under her bed. So, she marched right over to the spider that had a shadow of nightmares. She knelt down, scooped it up, and ate it in one big bite.

Lila, of course, grimaced as she swallowed. But then, it was over. The shadow was gone. And Lila knew she would have no bad dreams that night.

“My word, you actually did it,” a muffled voice echoed. Lila startled.

“Who’s there?” the little girl demanded, once again facing her bed. Or more correctly, staring directly underneath her bed.

There, Lila saw dust, crumbs, one singular sock, and no monster.

“Oh dear, no, I don’t do floors.”

Just then, Lila’s closet door creaked open. Inside was the tallest woman Lila had ever seen, made entirely of dark smoke. She wore great big glasses and a long white coat, and was furiously scribbling onto a piece of paper that had no end.

“I’ve been in your closet, darling,” the smoke lady said in a thick accent Lila had never heard before.

“And may I just say, bravo, bravo.” Wisps of the smoke floating around the lady turned into tiny hands and started a wave of applause. The lady kept on writing.

“I mean, really, that was quite rare. I knew you were going to be a fascinating case. It is not often a child can see a nightmare before it becomes a dream.”

Lila blinked. Twice. “You’re my monster?”

“Oh, please, I do prefer Doctor.” One of the wisps crept out toward Lila, holding a small rectangular card. It read:

DR. CORDELIA FOGG

Professor of Applied Oneirology

The girl was truly, deeply, unpleasantly stunned. And then she was mad.

“You’ve been in my closet this WHOLE time?” Lila just ate a spider. Lila, therefore, was not in a good mood.

“What have you been doing?” The words had become a shout.

Dr. Cordelia Fogg looked up now, puzzled.

“Why… taking notes. Of course.”

Lila’s lips began to quiver, and her eyes began to blur. She stomped over to her nightstand and crumpled up her letter. And then she threw it at the monster doctor.

“There! Read my notes!”

A tendril of smoke caught the paper ammunition and deftly unraveled it. Dr. Cordelia pushed up her glasses as she read the letter, her eyes moving quicker than Lila could track.

The doctor went quiet. She cleared her throat after a long moment.

“Lila, dear, I am sorry. I know the past year was hard. But you must see, look at what you did! You did the impossible. You beat it, all by yourself.” The doctor said the last part softly, as if it were a secret amongst explorers.

But Lila did not feel like an explorer. She just felt tired.

“But I didn’t want to do it alone.” Lila sniffled.

The doctor furrowed her brows and truly looked at the little girl for the first time. And she saw how small she was. And how brave she had to become in that short year.

Cordelia Fogg put down her quill and her never-ending paper. She crouched down next to the child.

“I’m here now.”

Lila looked up at the monster.

“Then you have to eat the next spider.”