Mermaid Pirate Dispatch

I froze, my whole body rigid with fear.

Screeeeeeek. Thump.

I tried to cry as quietly as I could, but when I sniffled there was a sudden shuffle of scraping and creaking, my bed shifted with a bump, and then all was quiet. I wanted to run to my parents’ bedroom but I couldn’t. I pictured huge black claws coming out from under my bed to slash at me and grab me before I could run. I knew I had to wait until morning.

So I cried and sniffled. I didn’t dare sleep but I also hoped I could fall asleep quickly so the morning would come faster.

Eventually I did pass out and the sun came up. Somehow the sun made me feel safe. Still, I jumped to the floor as far from my bed as I could, just in case, and I rushed to the bathroom to get ready for school.

I was in second grade, and unfortunately, adults don’t take second graders very seriously. I knew if I was going to solve my problem I needed help from my friends.

“Oh no.” Mike shook his head furiously. “Sorry, there’s nothing I can do for you.”

“What?” I asked, shocked. “You’re my best friend. I’d help you if you had a monster problem!”

“Nope,” he insisted. “I don’t handle monsters. That’s a solid no from me. See if your parents can take care of it. Otherwise, you might just need to move to a different house.” He was shaking so hard his voice was wavering.

“Dude,” I said. “Are you sure you can’t just come over and look with me?”

Mike looked like he was rattling his brains shaking his head so hard.

Sam came and sat with us in the sand pit. “What are you guys talking about? Did I hear someone mention monsters?”

“Yeah,” I said. “Mike won’t come to my house and try to help me take care of a monster problem I have. I’m pretty sure I’ve got at least one under my bed.”

“Nice talking to you,” Sam said, quickly getting up and walking away.

“Wait!” I called out. “Not you too! Come on!” But Sam was long gone.

I sulked my way through the rest of the school day. What lousy friends! I wasn’t sure if I was more sad that I had monsters under my bed or that my friends were too chicken to help me.

I was still moping when I got home from school.

“What’s the matter hon?” Mom asked.

“Nothing,” I lied. It was the classic lie, everyone’s favorite, and when you are sad it is always very important that you say nothing is wrong.

“You look so sad though. Did you have a rough day at school? Tell me what happened.”

“It’s my friends,” I said.

“What did they do?”

“It’s not something they did, it’s something they won’t do. I asked them to help me take care of…” I trailed off. She wouldn’t believe me if I told her.

“Come on hon, you can tell me anything.” She smiled and knelt down to give me a hug.

“Well, I have monsters under my bed, and my friends are too scared to help me with them.”

“Oh,” she said, confused. “Monsters?”

“Yeah.”

“What makes you think you have monsters under your bed?”

“I hear things. Scraping. Bumping. Knocking. Sometimes my bed even moves a little.” I looked down, bracing for some kind of longwinded lecture about how monsters aren’t real.

“Oh hon,” she started. “I know nighttime can be scary. When we can’t see clearly it’s easy to let our imagination get out of control. I’ve cleaned all over this house, vacuumed under your bed, in your closet, everywhere. I haven’t ever seen any monsters.”

“They only come out at night mom.” I insisted.

“Well, next time they come, you can come and get me and your father and we’ll take a look,” she suggested. Was she crazy?

I became overwhelmed, probably because of how stupid that idea was. “I can’t get out of bed when the monster is there. He’ll reach out with his claws and grab me.”

“Well jump as far from the bed as you can and come running as fast as you can,” she suggested.

“The monster can reach all the way to my door,” I replied. “I can’t jump that far!” I was sobbing. She just held me.

“Would it help if I told you I thought I had monsters under my bed when I was your age?” She offered.

I sniffled. “Really? What happened?”

She smiled. “Nothing. There were no monsters. It was just my imagination. I think you’re probably letting your imagination get the better of you too.” She added. There it was. She didn’t believe me. I rolled my eyes but she didn’t see because we were still hugging. I released her from the hug and backed away.

“Well, I should do my homework,” another great lie. Parents love that one.

“Good,” she said, smiling. And I ran up to my room.

I guess I’ll just have to try to take on the monsters on my own, I thought to myself. I gathered some supplies. I snuck a baseball bat up to my room from the garage. I borrowed a football helmet from my older brother’s room. I found a flashlight in my toybox and made sure it still worked. Only barely, but my dad was stingy about batteries so I decided it’d be good enough.

My plan was to lower myself head first with the helmet on and see if I could catch a glimpse. The bat was for whacking it if I needed to, or for pushing myself back up if retreat was the safer option.

That night I told my parents I’d tuck myself in and went to sleep with the helmet, flashlight, and bat in my bed. My heart pounded while I waited. After a while I fell asleep, unable to stay awake any longer. But I was startled awake by a familiar, terrifying sound.

Screeek. Thump.

My heart was racing. I put on the helmet and grabbed the bat in one hand and the flashlight in the other. I turned on the flashlight and knelt near the edge of the bed. I was breathing heavily.

Screeek. Thump.

I closed my eyes, bent over until the heavy helmet was resting on the edge of the bed, and began to slide forward, propelling myself slowly with my knees. Just as the weight of the helmet left the mattress it slid off my head and tumbled to the floor with a loud bang. Quickly I reached down and snatched it off the floor so it wouldn’t roll around.

The scratching stopped, but there was no shuffle like there normally was after I made a noise. I lowered my head further and turned on the flashlight.

I expected red, glowing eyes. I waited for sharp claws to slash me to ribbons. I waited for a growl, or a mouth full of sharp teeth and hot, slimy drool. Instead I saw… feet? Some kind of chair? A window? I got the rest of the way on the ground and turned to lie on my belly. It was hard to make out what I was seeing, so I scooted closer, allowing my head to go under the bed.

My whole perspective swung around on me. My face was now sticking out from under a different bed as though I was climbing out from under the bed. I looked back. My body was still on the floor of my room, but now if I crawled forward I would be crawling into some other room, coming from under the bed in that room! My mind did somersaults trying to process the situation.

I saw that the feet belonged to an old man. He was dressed in pajamas and he was using some kind of walker to get around. As he slid it forward it scraped along the floor, then he slammed it down with a thump!

He didn’t seem scary, so I crawled out from under his bed and stood up in his room. He screamed and grabbed his chest, stumbling backward onto a chair he had in the room.

“Oh my goodness!” he exclaimed with a deep, raspy voice. “You scared the daylights out of me!”

“Sorry,” I said. “Who are you?”

“You don’t recognize me?” he asked, still shaking, but smiling.

“Nope,” I said. I wasn’t lying.

“I’m you,” he said, grinning.

I stood there and looked him over. “No,” I said. “You’re not.”

“I am,” he insisted. “I’m you, but in the future. Our whole lives the underside of our bed will link our rooms together at night. When you were an infant, if you had crawled under your crib, you could have come to visit me on my… our deathbed. Be careful during your midlife years, if you climb under your bed then you might very well climb up your own butt!” He laughed heartily until he started coughing.

“So as I age, you’ll get younger?” I asked.

“Sort of. From my perspective, you’re getting younger now. It just depends on which half of our life you’re in.”

“Huh.” I said, trying to figure out what it all meant. “How?” I asked.

He laughed. Or, I laughed? “We never did figure that out kid,” he said. “And I don’t think there’s any good reason for it either. Just some kind of weird glitch in the universe. Now go get back in bed. I’ll try to keep it down for you.”

I peered at him.

“Really kid, that’s it. There’s nothing more to it. Just… don’t tell your parents. In fact, don’t tell anyone. It’s better if you don’t talk about it.”

I shrugged and climbed back under the bed, coming out back in my room. I was awake for a long time after that trying to figure out what kinds of cool things I could do now that I had made this discovery, but I fell asleep before I could think of anything.

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