The Bowl Waits

New ones are coming. Pad feels it in the stones. The cottage shifts, beams sigh like tired lungs. Dust stirs where no wind blows. Houses know when hands are changing. So does he.

Thomas is gone. Kind, warm as rising bread. He left cream, left crusts, winked toward the counter as if he truly saw. “Padraigín, my lad,” he’d say, and then only “Pad,” as if the shortness were a secret. Now Thomas is earth. Quiet. And Pad tends alone.

A week of strangers. The cream bowl stays empty. Pad recalls Thomas’s words: “Here you go, Pad—little cream to keep you kind; wouldn’t want you to sour into a boggart.” He nods to the memory, wishing the voice were still warm in the rafters, wishing he could smell Thomas’s pipe smoke in the beams. No boggy. Keep him quiet.

He curls in his hollow behind the hearth, arms wrapped tight, claws pressed into his palms to keep them from wandering. Good Pad. Keep the house whole. Hold the boggy tight. The house groans. A key scratches iron. Hinges cry. Boots clatter inside. Heavy—Michael, broad-shouldered, smelling of iron sweat and leather. When he sets down boxes, he presses a hand to his back with a small grunt, then straightens quick if the children are watching. He hums a scrap of a tune as he drops another box, never finishing it, and later his hand is gentle when he tousles the boy’s hair. A quicker tread—Elena, sharp perfume, a dusting of flour on her skirt. She wipes her hands on her skirt even when they’re already clean, leaving smears of flour. She hums when she thinks no one listens, a thin thread that snaps the moment she starts giving orders. Children’s laughter splinters into the corners: Daniel, restless, crumbs always in his pockets; he taps the table with his fingers when he’s meant to be still, quick little beats until Elena swats his hand. Sophie, red hair wild, whispering secrets into Finn’s ear. She carries pebbles in her dress pockets, smooth ones she shows only to the dog.

Finn: black-and-white, bright eyes, loyal nose pressed too close to Pad’s walls, tail thumping at nothing by the warm bricks. Sometimes, when the hearth glowed low, his muzzle would nudge at the crack, and Pad almost reached through, almost scratched that eager ear—then pulled back. Better unseen.

Elena lifts the small carved bowl—Thomas’s gift—and squints. “What’s this for—mice?” She rinses it, grimaces at the old cream ring. Sets it beside the sink to dry. Daniel touches it, curious. “Mum, why’s there a tiny bowl by the counter?” “Leave it,” she says, already turning. Later, Pad drags the bowl back to its place.

In the afternoon, the dish rack trembles. A drinking glass, still beaded with water, shows a hairline crack spidering through its side. When no one looks, it inches toward the lip. Pad steadies it with both hands, nudges it back. In the morning a sliver is missing, though nothing fell.

When they sleep, he tends. The broom’s rasp steadies his breath. He straightens chairs, presses a loose peg home, tightens the window latch that chatters in the wind. The house settles, grateful. He glances to the counter. The bowl is bare. Tomorrow. Another night. Still empty.

The air thins in the hollow. He rocks. Claws bite skin; a warm thread runs down his wrist. Cream would bind me. Cream would hold me. Empty bowl; loosened chain. Iron stings his tongue when he licks the wound. The boggy shifts under his ribs, smiling. Pad bites his knuckle to keep quiet. Thomas kept me. Thomas knew.

Desperate, he drags down the heavy leather book. Dust curls in his nose. Pages rasp under his nails. He flips until the word appears: Boggart. A crude drawing, a stiff little entry; the human name for what he calls boggy. A line beneath the picture reads, neat and sure: Neglected, a brownie may sour into a boggart. He traces it with a shaking claw. Cold truth.

He hauls a drawer open and wrestles a thick pen free—heavy as a hammer to him. He spreads a scrap on the table, pins one corner with his elbow, then grips the pen in both hands. Shoulders hunched, he shoves the tip across the paper. The letters come out tall and crooked. A hard-won C, a skidding R, the E like a ladder of three short bars. The A wobbles wide. The M takes two tries, an extra shaky stroke. Ink puddles at the turns; by the last line his forearms burn. On a second scrap he forces it larger, needful: CREAM.

He props the leather book open to the picture, lays the copied scrap beside it, and drags his bowl onto the note—proof, plea, chain. Then back into the wall, eye to the seam.

Steps. Michael. He stops. Brow lifts. With two fingers he closes the leather book and nudges it aside—tired, practical. He picks up the scrap that says CREAM, rubs the same spot on his beard he always rubs when thinking, and calls: “Daniel?” The boy shuffles in, hair mussed, shirt wrinkled, a couple of crumbs dropping. “You think this is funny?” Michael asks, weary more than angry. “No,” Daniel whispers. Michael sighs. “Not now.” He stays a moment longer by the bin, jaw tight, before walking away.

Pad’s chest hollows. Thomas never thought so. He digs claws into his arm until warmth slicks his skin. Rocks, bites his lip. Please. Understand. The boggy chuckles low in his ribs.

Night. His fists clench until nails pierce flesh. The mutter rises, breaks, and blackness takes him. Morning light is a dull knife. His mouth tastes iron. His arms throb.

A scream splits the house.

His hollow is in the kitchen wall—he cannot see. He scrambles, claws scraping wood, scurries through the narrow dark. Cobwebs net his face, dust stings his nose. Upward, following the sound, until a blade of light pours through a seam. He presses to it.

Sophie sits on the floor, one boot half-on, a thin shard jutting from the sole. She bites her lip, whispering into Finn’s ear—“it’s okay, it’s okay”—before the pain yanks a scream out of her. The sound knifes Pad’s chest; for a moment he hears Thomas’s last cough in the same timbre. Michael storms in, voice hard enough to shake the timbers. Elena gathers both children, face gone white. Daniel reaches and snatches his hand back, helpless. He stares at the boots as if they’ve betrayed him. Pad grips the beam until splinters bite. This is my fault. Hold. Hold. The boggy grins inside him, teeth scraping laughter along his ribs. A week unfed, and I feel it: Pad thinning, boggy thickening.

Night again. The inner wall tears. Boggy floods through.

Pad drowns—awake inside his own body. The boggy rises tall: claws sharp, teeth too many. Pad watches through his own eyes as it turns on Finn. The dog barks once and lunges, brave. The boggy catches him mid-leap, claws hooking into flank. Finn yelps, kicks, snaps back. For a breath, hope—then the other hand clamps his throat. A growl rattles out, part Pad, part boggy. Claws rake down, parting fur. Blood beads along the tiles, threads into the grout. Finn’s legs scrabble, tail thumps frantic; he collapses on his side, panting a high keening sound—hurt, but alive. The boggy smiles wider and licks a red line from one claw as if tasting cream. The whimpers awaken the humans upstairs, Pad can hear their feet scrambling down the stairs.

The family bursts in and freezes. They see. Not Pad. The boggart they would name from the book; the boggy he carries. It grins over Finn’s heaving body.

Michael snatches a knife from the counter. His hand trembles, jaw set. He steps forward. The boggy tilts its head, amused. Every drawer slams open. Knives rattle, leap, hover—silver teeth circling the room. Michael falters. A flick of a claw. One knife hammers into Michael’s thigh. He drops with a howl, his own blade clattering away. Another flick. A knife screams past, grazing his cheek—just a breath from the eye—leaving a red line to his jaw. He gasps, stunned, one hand on his leg, the other to his face. Elena shrieks and hauls the children back; her voice breaks when she yells, thinner than her usual sharpness. Daniel strains to step forward, Elena’s grip iron; Sophie buries her face in her mother’s skirt, whispering Finn’s name.

Pad thrashes in the dark inside his skull. Stop. Not them. Not me. He claws at the inner wall until his arms are slick. His throat strains; no sound.

The boggy laughs, drunk on their fear. The hovering knives tilt toward the family.

Pad pounds harder. Hold. Push. And then—Thomas: flour on his hands in the garden; the cracked hum by the fire; a laugh that shook the rafters; the wink as he set the bowl down like a blessing into the shadow. Good lad, Pad. My lad.

He grips that warmth and crams it into the crack the boggy made. His head feels split, his chest burning as if the words will consume him forever. With a last, tearing heave, his voice breaks free.

“LEAVE HOUSE NOW!”

The words strip his throat raw. The family jerks as if struck. Elena’s hum flickers once—thin, desperate—and dies as she gets her shoulder under Michael’s arm; Daniel takes the other side; Sophie clings, reaching back to whistle for Finn. The dog pushes up on trembling legs and limps after them, leaving small, shining dots on the floor. Michael’s mouth opens around a sound that wants to become his scrap of a tune and comes out as a rag of breath. Pad braces inside, binding the boggy with whatever is left of himself. Go. Cross the threshold.

The door slams. The car engine catches. The hovering knives drop and clatter across the tiles.

Silence widens. The boggy ebbs.

Pad folds to the kitchen floor. Blood streaks his forearms and mouth; dots of Finn’s blood mark the tiles like a path. The house groans low, grieving and relieved at once. He curls around his hands and rocks, a small shape in a room suddenly too large, and weeps. The bowl waits on the counter, empty as a grave.