Monster vs. Boy, page 3
Just to be sure, Mim listened at her closet door…and heard voices. One, two, three, four! So many voices at once!
She scampered for the narrow nook, tripping over boxes. She heard her closet door yank open. Light speared the shadows as she crouched in the nook, panting. Who was coming? Would they hurt her? Would they be a friend?
“This old closet gives me the creeps.” The grown-up waded into the books, reckless and uncaring. “Maybe that’s why I never clean it.”
“I think it’s cool. We could make a fort in here.” The girl bounded ahead of the grown-up, and Mim tucked into herself with her hands over her snout.
“Tree forts are more fun,” the horrible boy said. “We should definitely build one of those instead. Let’s start now.”
His voice sent a shudder through Mim. She’d promised herself she’d never let him in again, yet here he was.
“I like tree forts,” the larger boy said. He didn’t fill up her closet with lots of talk, but the width of him scared her. He filled up her doorway.
“Well, let’s get to it.” The grown-up gathered up the tent. “Toss out anything broken. We’ll donate what we don’t use anymore.”
A spark flared inside Mim’s chest, where it pinged from heart to heart, faster and faster. This was her closet. How dare they touch anything!
Mim wanted a friend to help her make a book work but not like this. Not with any of them.
* * *
—
Then the invaders were moving Mim’s boxes. So many scents at once. So many footsteps stomping across her overturned nest of ribbons and wrap. Except for the horrible boy, who lurked at the entrance to her closet, peering around.
“Be careful,” he called to the girl as she climbed over the pile of books he’d thrown.
The grown-up passed him some of Mim’s thickest books—the best ones for building towers. “For the donation pile,” he said. “I haven’t read these cookbooks in years, but someone else will want them.”
Mim didn’t know what a donation pile was. She just knew that the horrible boy was stacking her things outside her closet.
Then the larger boy plunged into Mim’s narrow nook. She held her breath, fairly certain he was too wide to fit all the way in.
“Don’t!” the horrible boy shrieked. “Anything could be back there!” He lunged into Mim’s closet, pushing through the mess and past the grown-up and the girl.
“You mean like Bakers’ Brawl trophies?” The larger boy’s voice boomed in her ears. “Wow, so many! Cool aprons too. This one has a polar bear with wings on it.” The larger boy was eating, his hand reaching into his pocket every now and then to retrieve a snack and pop it in his mouth. Chomp, chomp, chomp went his jaws.
Mim shivered, imagining his teeth chomping down on her. She readied her fingernails. They weren’t pointed, but they were thick enough to gouge his skin if she had to scare him away.
“My trophies!” the grown-up said. “I forgot they were here.”
The spark inside Mim flared—they were hers! She used them when an itch sneaked between her scales and wouldn’t budge.
As the grown-up picked up her box and carried it out, her trophies clattered together. “Here’s my first trophy ever,” he said from outside her closet.
How could she get her things back?
“You know, I didn’t win my first few contests either. But I got better with practice, just like you boys. I have a good feeling about you two this year.”
“So do I,” the larger boy called out. “Who was your partner when you were in junior division?”
“That would be Faye—my sister.” The grown-up reentered Mim’s closet and picked up another one of her boxes. How could she stop him?
“Dawz told me Mom was a terrible cook,” the girl said. “Was that why you lost?”
“Of course not! Faye had unusual ideas that didn’t always work. But when they did, they were spectacular. She made those aprons for us. New ones for every contest we entered.”
“You never told me she could sew.” The girl turned to the horrible boy.
“I didn’t know.” The horrible boy scowled. “Do we have to talk about her?”
“But you never want to talk about her.”
“Pop says I don’t have to, if I don’t want to.”
“Hey, could I borrow an apron for the Junior Bakers’ Brawl?” The larger boy turned to her boy. “We could each wear one.”
The horrible boy moved close enough for his scent to overpower Mim. Sweet with a nasty tang.
“Why? They’re old. And I bet they smell. Everything in here does.” He glanced around, probably searching for her.
The larger boy sniffed one of Mim’s aprons. “Smells fine to me. And they’re so cool! We’d look awesome.”
“I don’t know. I’d feel…weird.” A strange look crossed the horrible boy’s face, and he focused straight at Mim as if he knew she’d be hiding there.
Mim’s scales rippled. How had he known where to find her? Could he sense her?
She hissed, loud enough to scare both boys.
Terror crept over the horrible boy’s face like an army of spiders, but the larger boy was too stupid to notice.
“Did you hear that?” the horrible one whispered to his friend. He pointed right at Mim.
She hissed again.
“Did I hear what?” The larger boy peered. “What are you pointing at?”
“What do you mean? Can’t you see the monster? At the back of that nook?”
“Quit kidding.” The larger boy turned back to the aprons. “Which one do you like?”
“But it’s right there!” The horrible boy’s voice cracked, and something cracked inside Mim too. She had to be visible to more than the horrible boy!
“What are you looking at?” The girl was suddenly at the horrible boy’s elbow, and he jumped. Behind them, the grown-up was heaving the blue barrel out of Mim’s closet.
“Nothing.” The horrible boy stepped between Mim and the girl like he was protecting her. “I…I must be seeing shadows. And hearing the wind.”
Mim was more than a shadow. More than wind. She hissed louder than loud to scare off the girl, the larger boy—everyone.
The girl gazed toward Mim, unseeing.
No, no, no! It couldn’t be. How could she be a good monster if she could only scare one horrible boy?
Mim stood. She raked the air with her fingernails.
The horrible boy flinched.
The girl turned away. “What’s under here?” She lifted Mim’s overturned nest.
“Looks like wrapping paper,” the larger boy said. “And lots of ribbons.”
The girl poked at Mim’s nest, but Mim couldn’t take her eyes off the horrible boy, whose eyes drilled back into hers. Were they connected? She didn’t want to share anything with him. Not her closet. Not her boxes and books. Not the air they both breathed.
The horrible boy broke eye contact first.
“Let’s just get everything out of here,” he said. “We can sort it in my room.” He shoved one box away from her nook and another, clearing a space around her hiding spot.
Mim puffed out a cloud of smoke and ash as big as her hand.
“Good idea,” the grown-up said. “Why don’t you pass out those boxes at the back?”
Soon, they were all shoving and carrying everything out of her closet, leaving Mim with an empty, echoing space.
She clawed and puffed, but no one reacted except the horrible boy. He never turned his back on her, but he never warned the others either.
Like she was not a threat.
Like she was just a shadow.
Chapter 7
By the time Pop and Jayla disappeared downstairs with the last of the boxes to donate or toss out, Dawz’s insides were bubbling like a pot of Pop’s pasta. He felt hot. Twitchy. He couldn’t sit still or rest, even though he was tired from moving boxes. The way the monster had clawed. Puffed smoke. Threatened his people. Dawz locked the closet door and got busy stacking books in front of it.
“What are you doing?” Atlas asked.
Dawz’s insides boiled hotter. If he explained, Atlas might think he was weird or something worse. But it would be easier than talking to Pop, and Dawz could use some help with keeping the monster in. Right now, it would be plotting ways to hurt him.
Dawz took a chance. He told Atlas why he needed to barricade the door. He described the monster and how it had hissed but only he noticed. And he kept busy stacking books in front of the door. He wanted it barricaded as soon as possible, but he also didn’t want to watch Atlas. If he looked freaked out, Dawz didn’t want to see it.
“And you really couldn’t see it?” Dawz asked as he shoved his last stack of books into place. His barricade didn’t look like enough to stop a monster.
Dawz risked a glance at Atlas, who stood in the middle of the room like an immovable island. As Dawz watched, he shook his head, gazing at the locked closet door with shock and awe.
“Wow, a real monster! I’ve hoped for this, but…what should we do with it?” he asked.
Dawz sucked in a breath, relieved that his friend believed him, that he hadn’t judged him or laughed at him. “Nothing. We shouldn’t go anywhere near it.” He tried to shove his whole bookcase in front of the barricade, but it didn’t budge.
“Should we tell your pop?”
“No!” Pop would probably think Dawz was making up stories. Or worse—he’d think Dawz was…different. Pop was too sensible—too down-to-earth—to ever be able to see a monster. He never wanted to read bedtime stories about monsters, but he did because Dawz and Jayla asked for them. He didn’t like to listen to Luiza’s stories about the monsters that used to haunt the town either. Pop liked to read cookbooks and guidebooks about which wild plants they could eat.
Atlas crossed his arms and grunted low, meaning he didn’t agree but would go along with it. Together, they pushed the bookshelf into place, then stepped back to stare at the barricade and what lay beyond it.
“It’s really in there?” Atlas asked.
“I saw it and smelled it too. It was breathing out clouds of smoke….” Dawz shook off the memory. It made it more real in his mind. He could see the monster when he shut his eyes, as if it was right in front of him instead of behind a locked and barricaded closet door.
Atlas grabbed one of Dawz’s cryptozoology books off the barricade. “Maybe we can find it in here. Then I could see what it’s like.”
Dawz nodded, grateful for any ideas that would help. “Maybe we could learn its weaknesses.”
Atlas and Dawz had both read a ton of books about cryptozoology—the study of creatures who are rumored but not yet proven to exist. They’d listened to the stories Luiza told wide-eyed tourists from her favorite bench near the Bear Beast statue or her favorite table in Thea’s Café. It had been scary fun to try to connect her story monsters with ones from their books, even though they hadn’t found any matches. But now they had a real monster to research.
Dawz had always worried that might happen.
He sat on his mini-trampoline, bouncing slightly. He flipped through his field guide of cryptid creatures as Atlas watched over his shoulder. The Thetis Lake monster, yeti, and kraken. It listed monsters who were confirmed hoaxes as well as ones who’d been proven to be real, like the rare coelacanth—a deep-sea fish with spiny fins. Supposedly, it had vanished with the dinosaurs, but Dawz’s book said it could be found in the Indian Ocean and the waters near Indonesia.
“What about that?” Atlas pointed to a chupacabra—a blood-sucking dog-thing from Puerto Rico with spikes down its back. The book said it could hop like a kangaroo.
Dawz turned the page. “It’s nothing like that. Plus, this monster has horns, remember?” Impressive, curved ones that made Dawz shudder.
“Okay then, maybe a jackalope?”
A jackalope was a jackrabbit with antelope horns that turned out to be fake. “Not even close. It had hooves, not rabbit feet, and a furry head like a musk ox.” Dawz wondered if the fur was as sharp as quills. He hoped he never found out.
They looked through page after page of cryptids, each one a new threat now that they’d found a real monster. How many other monsters might be loose in the world? Dawz slammed the book shut, as if it would lock them all inside. “I don’t think we’ll find it in here.”
“We’ve got loads more to look through.”
Dawz sighed. “I guess. But this monster has different features than anything we’ve read about. Hooves and hands. Fur and scales. It’s like a combo of creature parts, like the monsters Luiza talks about.” One of her stories was about a fang-toothed bear-monster like the town’s statue. Most townsfolk laughed when she said the Bear Beast had been a real creature once, but Dawz never had.
“You know what we should do?” Atlas said. “We should record everything about it. I can stay for a sleepover, so we’ll have lots of time.”
Dawz hadn’t thought about sleeping. How would he ever sleep again, knowing the monster was on the other side of a thin wooden door?
Maybe he could sleep at Atlas’s. But he wanted to make sure the monster stayed put. If only Atlas could sleep over every night.
“We can record how tall it is,” Atlas was saying. “How big its feet are—”
“Its hooves, you mean.”
“Right. Hooves. We can be real cryptozoologists. Or you can, because I can’t see, hear, or smell it.” Atlas strode to the barricade and leaned one ear close to the door. “Do you think I could one day? I can’t be a good cryptozoologist if I can’t observe it.”
“Don’t get too close,” Dawz warned. Seeing the monster was the worst thing that had happened to him.
“I’d rather know what’s coming at me.” Atlas reached over the bookcase to stroke the closet door. “Funny…but Luiza never mentioned that only one person could see the monsters.”
“I’d rather not be the only one.” Dawz thought about Mom then. Her mutterings must have been about a monster she’d seen. Was it somehow her fault that he could see one?
Yellow feathers—everywhere, he’d once heard her say. She’d been sweeping the balcony, even though it had looked clean to him. Then she’d sobbed. He hated that sound—the way it tore at him. He’d often wished he knew his dad, or Jayla’s. Maybe one of them could’ve helped Mom get better or come over to make dinner when she forgot. But whenever he’d asked Mom about them, she waved him away, saying she didn’t want their dads around. When he’d asked for their names or where they lived, she gazed at Dawz as if she’d forgotten.
Dawz hugged his knees to his chest. He couldn’t imagine Mom competing in a Bakers’ Brawl contest or sewing aprons, like Pop had said. He’d never seen her bake or sew. But for sure she’d had unusual ideas. Dawz had never told anyone about Mom’s weirdness—not even Pop. It felt like something to keep hidden. He hoped she never came back, although he’d never admit it. What kind of son didn’t want to see his own mother?
“Dawz, did you hear me?” Atlas said. “We should make a plan for if it escapes.”
Suddenly, Dawz was exhausted. This was his life now—not only guarding this closet and keeping secrets from Pop but battling this monster if it got out. He would never be able to rest. And he didn’t know if he could do it.
“Dawz?” Atlas nudged him.
“Right,” Dawz said. At least he had Atlas. Dependable Atlas. “We should make a plan.”
“Great, because I have some ideas.” Atlas smiled like this was a fun adventure. “And it starts with lightsabers.”
Chapter 8
At dusk, Mim lay snout down in her empty closet. Empty of boxes. Empty of books to share with a friend. Empty of her nest of ribbons and wrap, of scratching places, of ways to block the horrible boy from entering.
She couldn’t believe it was gone. All gone.
A spring wind whooshed into the high-up nook, but Mim ignored it. It carried mysterious scents that might be musky flowers, fumes from a car, or worms squirming in dirt. It blew them around the empty space in her closet. It blew and blew until the scents tickled Mim’s snout.
Forget the empty, the smells said. Don’t you want to know us?
Mim scrambled into the high-up nook. She needed those scents to soothe her. To tell her that she could be brave enough to leave her closet. That she could find hope outside.
She lay sideways with her tail flattened and tried to press her face into the space where the wind sneaked in. Those scents, just beyond reach. Promises of a better nest. A better home. Free from the boy.
But she couldn’t get into her regular position. Her horns got caught on either side of the sloped ceiling.
She tried this way and that. She shimmied. She used force. No matter what she did, the high-up nook didn’t fit Mim anymore.
Had the nook shrunk? It looked the same size.
Had her horns grown? Grown!
* * *
—
Mim didn’t need to eat, although she’d tried it every so often, just for fun. She nibbled a lace-up shoe once. It tasted dry and rubbery. She ate a dead moth. Her insides didn’t like it. But whether she ate or not, Mim never grew. She could always fit in the high-up nook next to the roof.
Until the night she couldn’t.
Mim climbed down to her closet floor and hurried to measure herself. She hardly stopped to notice that the crack in the door had been blocked from the other side, and the keyhole too. Good riddance! She didn’t want to watch the horrible boy anymore.
Mim stood with her snout against the door. Usually, the top of her head fit under the doorknob. But now, the doorknob was level with her eyes! She was taller.
How terrible to be taller!
