For a seven year old, Jimmy
was a pretty typical boy. He was kind of
short and what his mom called husky. Dad
gave him a close brush cut at the beginning of summer that was now growing out;
it spiked on its own now. He was tough
and afraid of almost nothing. Actually,
his father was often heard calling him “Red Chief”, telling friends that most
living things were afraid of Jimmy. His
mom would wrinkle her nose and squirm when he would show her a frog or snake,
but secretly smile to herself at her little man’s teasing. He was very much his father’s son.
The walls of his bedroom
were filled with posters of movie monsters; from Lon Chaney as The Wolfman and
Boris Karloff as The Mummy to modern movie monsters of Jason and Michael
Meyers. The shelves were filled with the
monster models he and his dad put together (well his dad put together, Jimmy
just watched for most of them). Jimmy
knew every one of the monsters wasn’t real; they were all make believe. But there was
a monster he was afraid of. Dad didn’t
know about it. His mom and sister didn’t
know about it. Even his best friend
didn’t know about it. But it was very,
very real.
This monster lived under his
bed. He knew it was real. The thing would stretch its slimy green arm
from under the bed, searching for his foot at night. It’s long, sharp nails would run along the
bottom of his foot.
After the first couple times
the monster touched him, Jimmy began shoving anything he could under the
bed. Toys, his and his sister Molly‘s,
books, clothes, whatever he could find.
He had hoped it would keep the monster from coming out. Then there were the covers. Jimmy was always covered from his neck to his
toes, even in the heat of summer.
Everything was working out fine.
Almost a year had gone by since he had been touched. The plan worked! But then today, Halloween,
his mom said something that made Jimmy’s skin crawl. “Clean under that bed or there will be no
trick or treating for you young man.” It
was Jimmy’s worst nightmare come true.
He sat in the middle of the
room, staring at the bed. He didn’t look
under the bed itself, just the bed. What
was he going to do? He didn’t want to
miss out on Halloween but Jimmy also didn’t want to tell his mom and dad WHY he
didn’t clean from under his bed. He sat
there staring and thinking; thinking and staring. He suddenly sat bolt
straight; his eyes wide.
He’d make a deal. Maybe like in that story The Devil and Tom
Walker the librarian at school read to them. He began to grin; he knew it was a deal the
monster couldn’t refuse. Grinning from
ear to ear, Jimmy began to remove toys, both his and his sister’s, clothes and
what may have been food at one time. He
not only put his things away but his sister’s as well. Clothes were put in the hamper. Jimmy did not
expect to see them again. He had grown
in the past year.
With everything out from
under the bed, Jimmy was ready to deal with the monster. From across the room,
Jimmy stood bent sideways at his waist as he looked under the bed. Nothing.
He wiped his sweaty palms on his jeans and moved in closer. Still nothing. With the broom in his hand, Jimmy swiped it
along the underside of the bed. Nothing,
not even a cobweb.
He knelt there at the side of
the bed. The blank look on Jimmy’s face
said it all, “Where is it?”, he was shocked it wasn’t there. But as his grandpa used to tell him, “Don’t
look a gift horse in the mouth.” He had no
idea what that meant but he didn’t think this was the time to find out. He heard something. It was his best buddy, Billy, calling him to
play. He grabbed his mitt and out he
went. Jimmy forgot about the monster for
the afternoon.
After dinner, Jimmy and
Molly began getting ready for their night of begging door to door. They were dressed as their favorite
fantasies. Jimmy was The Wolfman. Dad did his face makeup so he would look
hairy and Mom found an old grey wig for him to wear from a thrift store. She took one of his older suit coats and tore
the sleeves. It was a size or so too
small for him and he’d flexed what muscles he had to tear at the seam in the
back. It gave the illusion of bursting
out of his clothes during his change.
Molly was two years older
and going through what Mom kept telling Dad was a perfectly normal phase. She was now into “boy bands” and Miley
Cyrus. So Molly, in her long blonde wig
and wireless microphone danced a few steps ahead of Jimmy and their parents.
Jimmy spotted Billy. The two
put their heads together, whispering.
The two boys had been plagued by the same bully at school since they
were in kindergarten. Jimmy had spilled
his guts to Billy about the monster. He
was now telling him about his plan.
Billy thought it was brilliant.
Billy had also thought Jimmy should leave his brain to science. However, when Jimmy asked if he’d like to
sleep over, he gave him a sideways glance and said no. Jimmy was on his own.
Dad went through the candy,
just as he did every year. Jimmy and
Molly noticed that the candy Dad liked best was always the candy he found to be
suspicious. After watching some old
horror movies and eating candy, Mom announced it was time for bed. It felt like a cold iron hand clamped around
Jimmy’s heart. Sweat formed on his upper lip.
Slowly, he climbed the stairs.
Once in his room, he looked
around. Nothing was different from that
afternoon. He slipped into his pajamas,
took a quick look under the bed, then made a mad dash to it. Shaking, he pulled the covers around
him.
Then it dawned on him. If the monster was still here, how would he
get it to talk if he was wrapped like a mummy in blankets? The blankets prevented the monster from
coming out. Very slowly, he started to
move his foot from under the quilt. A few minutes later, he heard it. The slithering, slurping sound of the monster
as he moved under the bed. Jimmy tensed,
forcing himself to relax. He could do
this. That’s when he felt it.
The long nail of the slimy
finger slowly moved from the ball of this foot to his heel. Jimmy cleared his throat, just a couple of
small coughs.
“Hey, Mr. Monster! I’d
really like you to leave me alone.” His
voice shaking only a bit.
“My name is Maurice, but
please, call me Morry. All my future meals
do. I can’t leave Jimmy. You are my human for the moment, you, my dear
boy, were assigned to me. By the way,
I’m not here to eat you. I just always
wanted to say that.”
Jimmy was impressed but not
enough to allow Morry to stay. He knew
not every human had a monster under their beds or in their closets. Billy didn’t have a monster.
“Tell me Morry, why am I your human? Why doesn’t every human
have a monster? What are you going to do to me?” Jimmy was getting less scared and more
interested.
“Questions, questions.” Morry began to explain the order of monster
and human relationships. Monsters scare
and humans get frightened. “You see
Jimmy, the relationship is chosen for us.
You didn’t choose me and I certainly didn’t choose you. Usually these things are done at the time of
the human’s birth. I’ve been with you
that long. Seven years; seven long
years. I’ve watched you grow into a
strong willed young boy. I’ve had other
humans before you and I will have others after you. It appears you are too strong willed for the
Elders liking. You, Jimmy, are a very
brave young man.
“By the way, all the toys,
books, clothes and anything else you stuffed under the bed? Doesn’t stop a monster from being under the
bed; they just give them something to do.
We are flexible beings and can change our size at will. Now, Jimmy, let’s get down to business and
get this done. I have to break your
strong will. I must scare you enough to
become a sniveling crybaby as it were.
And I’m sorry I have to do it. I
like you Jimmy.” Morry’s voice was
soothing, smooth and almost hypnotic.
Through blank, staring eyes
and a mouth drooping open (if his mom were to see him now she’d ask if he was
catching flies), Jimmy’s mind began to float back to the surface. “WAIT!”
Morry did not expect
this. His victims never spoke before the
end. He was losing his patience with
this boy.
“I…want…to make…a
deal…with…you.” Jimmy was having a problem finding his voice.
“What kind of a deal?” Morry
was never given a proposal before. This
intrigued him.
Jimmy shifted in bed, hung
over the side and was looking Morry right in the eyes. He began whispering to the monster that had
lived under his bed for the past seven years.
The monster who scared him. Morry
began to nod his head; he seemed to like the idea. He didn’t think here would be a
problem. He thought of himself as a
freelance monster. Putting a slimy hand
out, he took Jimmy’s and considered the deal sealed in a gentlemanly
manner. Morry was a monster that stood
by his word.
Jimmy watched as Morry left
his room by way of the window. He was
almost sad to see him go. What was he
thinking! Jimmy shook his head. He was happy Morry left; even happier that
Morry had made the deal with him.
The next morning, with a
bounce in his step, Jimmy walked to school with Billy. As they came to the corner of Main and
Elmwood, their steps became slower. They
were passing the house of Boris; the bully that had bothered them for the past
three years. Billy cringed as Boris came
out of the house. Standing there and
shaking in place, Billy squeezed his eyes shut waiting to get slugged. Nothing happened. Boris walked by, never saying a word to
them. He hung his head like he was
looking for spare change on the street.
Jimmy whispered to Billy and nodded.
As the two friends began to walk to school, Jimmy looked back at the
window of Boris’s bedroom. Looking out
at him was Morry giving him the thumbs up.
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