Chapter Text
For as long as Andrew could remember no matter what house he went to, there were always a monster in the house. Now at first he didn’t fully understand the word monster. No his first thoughts were vampires werewolves or zombies. Monsters can also be human. When it happened the first time it was a shock, who knew grown men liked to have play time with little boys when the lights turned off.
The second time at the next house was just as devastating. The second monster had a friend who liked to join in during play time. Andrew never had a stable home. The monsters either wanted to play at night or he was ignored all together. Sometimes the monsters got a little rough when Andrew fought back and landed himself some injuries to show for his “bad” idea. For someone who was seven, he had to learn to hide a limp and bruises from other kids his age. He wasn’t a talker before and those houses didn’t help. Kids started to fear him, so he was left alone and never had a friend.
The house he was in now was a safe haven for him. At twelve years old it took longer then it should have to get a nice family. Cass and Richard spear was a dream come true for andrew, he got fresh cookies and hot chocolate. He was given access to Cass’s home library, and he got to read almost every book in her collection. She treated him the he was hers. He was so close to having a real family, but every house has a monster in it.
At night he could hear a weird clicking sound but it almost sounded like a trill. The noise was like a heart beat, or breathing. It always fell in time with his own breathing. He always felt like he was being watched, it was uncomfortable. He knew it could have been worse since it was only a sound but he hoped it would stay that way.
Sometimes the noise would go away for some nights others he could feel the vibrations through his bones. Andrew found himself missing it when it went away for longer periods of time. Sometimes when the monster under was more active he could feel it breathing around him. He never felt scared when it was around, he almost felt protected when it was around.
It was crazy, the kids when they were younger would complain about the monster under the bed, but now andrew could defend the one under his. He had had a few monsters under the bed, but they where just men who liked to play. He never had as much fun as they did during play time.
He wanted to meet the presence that was under him when he sleeped. He almost wanted to thank it for being there. It was a nice year, but deep down andrew knew that nice things never lasted no matter how nice they were. Cass’s son decided to come home from college and wanted to bond with the new kid in his house. Andrew had no problem with the monster that watched him sleep. He had a bigger problem with the monster down the hall.
All the no’s went ignored, the pleases and the stops. It seemed to encourage the monster down the hall. He would whisper sweet nothings that promised more pain, “aj your always so tight for me” or “all this fighting makes it more fun for the both us right aj?”
The words made him feel ruined. He was broken and tainted no matter how much he showered he would never be clean. He started to cut in order to feel control. He never did it in his room, because he didn’t want to taint the one thing he had control over with the ghost of hands running over his body. He never would have meet the monster under his bed if he didn’t cut in his room.
After one of the worst “bonding sessions” as the monster named drake liked to call it, he was left shaking. his hand were trembling, his mind was in pieces. He grabbed the knife he kept under his pillow and took to carving lines in neat rows. It looked like art to him, the red blood mixing with the pale skin that was always rapped in bandages and the shiny metallic shine that the knifes blade shined under the soft moon light.
He saw a shadow crawl out from the dark from the corner of his eye. The creature had bright blue eyes that would be impossible to put into words due to the intensity that the bleed into the darkness that replaced the whites of the eyes that he had. The skin was pale with patches of scars running down its arms and torso. The hair was long and shaggy and the deep red it was reminded Andrew of blood.
It had striking cheekbones and a jawline sharper then the knife in hand, but it was pretty. The one thing that was never mentioned when kids cried about the monster under the bed.
The monster slowly worked its way across the room before it got to the foot of his bed. Andrew wouldn’t say the feeling that he felt was fear, but he was deeply unsettled. The monster reached a lanky arm out towards him. Andrew froze once the arm reached him, as it grabbing his arm he felt his breath getting caught in his lungs as he waited for the pain to start moments after the touch settled. The monster moved the rest of his body around the bed to get a closer look at his arm, it let out a noise that resembled the kind of noice kids would make when they didn’t get what they wanted. It grabbed the knife from Andrews frozen hands and threw it somewhere near his closet.
It let out a series of clicks and growls like it was stringing together a sentence that was all to difficult to understand. It almost sounded worried in its rushed sounds that it let out. It was rubbing away at the blood while watching for a reaction from Andrew. Andrew released that he never felt that nauseating feeling after contact from another being. It was comforting in a way he was being cared for in a way that cass could never do because he didn’t want to hurt her anymore then he had to when he returned home from school black and bruised.
The moster was close to Andrew to the point where he felt the heat radiating off of it, each breath the creature took near him. Each breath felt warm on his neck causing him to shiver. The creature let go the moment it felt the shiver rake through Andrews body and look at him waiting to see any from or discomfort on his face. If only every monster he met was like that. The monster looked satisfied at the work it did with his arm. Andrew look down and questioned when it rapped his arm. Before Andrew could get a word out to the creature it disappeared into the darkest corners in the room and Andrew could only wonder if he had dreamt it all up.