A Monster in My House
Stiles was a small boy. One who had a small body with tiny, burned hands from trying to cook a meal for two at the age of seven. One with scraped up knees from cleaning up broken glass from the floor. One with tired, hazel eyes that reflected too many nights of nobody telling him it was bed time.
He walked down the hallway of his run down home, footsteps silent as to not wake the monster in the living room. The monster was always there. Always drinking the foul smelling liquid and glaring at Stiles with its blood red eyes and hating what it saw. Hating the skinny boy with the moles, and the hair, and the face of his mother. The face of a painful memory.
But this time, the monster wasn’t awake.
Stiles peeked around the corner of the door and into the dirty living room and at the beast limp against the couch. It’s broad chest rising and falling with each huge huff of air like the big waves of the sea. The ground littered with glass bottles, empty of a drink his mother had once said was forbidden to children.
Stiles lived with this monster every day of his life. And, just like so many nights before, he had to suck up his fear, and wake it. There was always the chance it would lash out and hit him and add to the purple and blue and yellow bruises along his back and face. But Stiles also knew that if it woke in the living room it would be even angrier than before.
So he sucked up his nerves, and touched its hand gently. He spoke softly into the darkness and put a smile on his face to try to hide the fear. “Wake up, Daddy. It’s time for you to go to your bed.”