Monster

I keep thinking my job is done, but she always comes back to me eventually. Oh, I know when she is coming for me. Yes, I have studied every footstep she makes in her little footed pajamas when she tip-toes into her safe green bedroom, past the dresser with the mirror, over the fluorescent-patterned space-themed rug, and sneaks ever so quietly, ever so carefully, underneath her twin sized bed. To me. I will know she's coming even before the door is all the way open. I get started when it opens slow, when her heels are lifted off the ground, when she twists the door handle so gentle as though if she were to treat it wrongly, even just a little, it might scream and clang and cause a real troublesome fuss. Yes, it's then when I start to pull my scaly lips over my scores of yellow, pointy teeth. It's then that I open wide all my eyes and pull out the crumbs with my stripey talons. And when she gets under the bed frame, I've got a big, monstrous grin on my face like I haven't got a care in the world.

I love those nights. Sometimes she smiles back, and we have great fun together and play cards or tell stories. Sometimes she just sits with me for a while before she goes to bed. Sometimes she wants a hug. It's my joy to be exactly what she needs me to be, but those aren't my favorite nights. On my favorite nights, the door flies open and before she has two steps into the room, she leaps like an Olympian onto the bed with a booming thud, and I cover my head with a few of my arms to brace for impact. And when she sleeps so easily, I feel like I can sleep, too. That maybe soon, I won't be needed anymore, and I can just leave my spiky teeth hidden and the crumbs in my eyes and roll over and just sleep forever. I guess I'm a lucky beast. One way or another, I smile every night.

But tonight, I have a new thought, as my six-fingered paw smooths out my unkempt mane for her. I think maybe I'll never get to rest. Because tonight is different. Tonight, the noisemakers are silent. No one is yelling or screaming or cursing, and no one is crying. But her gait is unmistakable. Has it been months since last time? Has it been years yet? Maybe when she is long free of them, still, on some nights she will hear them, and still on those nights she will need a monster to sit by. Maybe this isn't the kind of thing that ends. And I'll be there, even when she is old, watching the door, waiting to pounce on any foul invader and protect her little green room. But already, I am so tired. I don't want to go away. I want her to need me. I want her not to need me. I want to go away.

And sure enough, she crawls under the bed. She's older. I am smiling.