Monster

A monster in a closet, among other preadolescent woes

When I was twelve years old I met a monster.
I don't expect you to believe this. In fact, I don't even expect you to read any more of this. But I have to get it out.
The age of twelve is already terrible enough. Your own body becomes an alien life form, a science experiment that's constantly sprouting new and interesting developments, constantly changing and intent on embarrassing you every chance it gets. I don't know how well you made it through adolescence, but my face was a molten mess and my hair looked like a constant oil slick, despite my best efforts. I tripped when I walked, I knew the answers in class except for when I was called on, most of my hand-me-down clothes were dangerously close to threadbare, and I had no b***s to speak of. (My older sister assured me that I was simply a late bloomer and that I should just be patient. That was easy for her to say; she had something to fill out her shirts, another problem I found with the hand-me-downs. Stretched chests on shirts? Not becoming.)
I was not part of a clique. I wasn't even a member of the outcasts. I was just me. I guess that Julie Anderson was kind of my friend. She was my lab partner in science class and sometimes we would eat lunch together. But mostly I was alone.
I suppose that was a contributing factor to my meeting the monster, my disposition toward solitude. In a broom closet, of all places. Not that I normally frequented janitorial spaces, nor was I a huge admirer of the custodial arts. (Though I did kind of look up to the no-nonsense janitor Mr. Westlake. He was who he was, a fortysomething balding man with no sense of humor and absolutely no tolerance for idiocy. He did not care what anyone thought of him, and I wished desperately that I could be like that. But with a full head of glorious hair.) The real reason I wound up in the broom closet was Helen Cransky.
Helen Cransky was perfect. She was beautiful, with flawless skin and shiny thick hair. Her clothes were new and she always smelled like apple pie. Helen had a million friends and always turned her homework in on time. Helen was a dancer.
Helen was also a b***h.
She was a Mean Girl, and I am not exaggerating when I capitalize those two words. Helen Cransky was perfect on the outside, but if you were to split her open you would find bad thoughts and wriggling maggots, like something gone sour and rancid. She was just rotten on the inside, but none of the teachers ever saw that. They just saw Helen being perfect and kind, because she was smart enough to do her bullying when none of the adults could see or hear her. She had a sort of sixth sense about that kind of thing. Sometimes she would pinch me, hard, on the backs of my arms and legs when I walked by her in class.
Helen had a weird way of getting into your head and making you feel like dirt, just lower than low. She did this to me one rainy Monday morning. I had missed the bus and had to walk to school because both my parents were already at work. It's not really that far of a walk, and sometimes on nice days I skipped the bus on purpose. But this was a miserable day, raining the kind of rain that seems like it will never end, when all of the rain that could ever come down out of the sky is intent on coming down now. I had forgotten my umbrella and didn't own rain boots. If I missed the day or was tardy I would catch it from my mother. So I pressed on through the typhoon.
So it was that upon my arrival at school my shoes were covered in mud, my clothes were sodden and clung in a most unflattering manner, and my hair was harboring a waterfall. I headed to the locker rooms in search of a towel.
Helen and her friends were in there, primping in a cloud of perfume and talking about boys, as usual. I tried to squelch by unnoticed, but Helen caught sight of me in the mirror. I watched as her perfect features stretched into a malicious grin that she seemed to reserve specially for me.
'Look, girls!' she squealed with evident glee. 'It's the Swamp Thing!'
They all turned, pointing perfectly polished nails and cackling in delight. I stood frozen in my embarrassment, dripping on the floor and wishing that I could disappear into the puddle that was rapidly gathering around me.
'Well at least all that rain should help with the smell!' one of the girls said amid fresh peals of laughter.
(I know. My tormentors were not the most intelligent bunch. Recalling most of their taunts now, I cringe at the thought of my twelve year old self dissolving into tears at their bullying. But I was a misfit kid, and snappy comebacks were not exactly my forte.)
I ran from the locker room then, forgetting about the towel in my hasty departure. I fled across the gym floor, dimly aware that someone was yelling about muddy footprints. I didn't care. I flung open those gymnasium doors with a force that made them rebound and bang in protest against the walls. I darted down a side corridor that no one ever used and ducked into the first open door that I saw.
I was in the broom closet.
I shut the small door behind me.
It was dim, but not dark. There was no light on in the closet but there was a vent down toward the bottom of the door.
When I say "broom closet" you may be thinking some tiny corner cubby for a couple of mops and buckets, but this custodian's keep was large enough for two floor to ceiling shelves of supplies, a mop sink area, various cleaning implements, a large tool box, and the floor buffer, Mr. Westlake's pride and joy. The dusky light illuminated up to the first shelf of supplies, leaving the back quarter of the closet in shadow.
I noticed none of this at first. I was aware of my cold wet clothes clinging to me, my likewise wet and uncomfortably heavy shoes, and above all my hot embarrassment, burning and tight in my chest. I'm not a big crier, but that day I'd had enough, and I let it out with loud, honking sobs, grateful for my solitude. It was disgusting. Huge teardrops, snot running down my face, and I make the ugliest faces when I cry, all pinched and red like an infant's face with none of that brand new human cuteness. I was a mess, and I did not care.
After several minutes of wallowing in my own misery, I again took up the search for a towel. I found some clean rags in a box. Trusting in the fastidiousness of Mr. Westlake, I took one to mop my face and blow my nose. I then took another and began working on my hair.
That's when I noticed it. The animal smell. It was wet and heavy, like when a dog comes in from the rain, but more musky. There was also a heavy breathing, almost a rumbling really, that I would have noticed sooner had I not been crying in such an ungainly fashion. For the second time that day I froze, this time in fear.
There was a bear in the broom closet!
'Hello?' I squeaked, even though I knew it had to be an animal in there with me.
I told myself to calm down. There was simply no way that there could be a bear in this closet with me, let alone a bear on school property. I thought it more than likely that at least a few people would have noticed a bear lumbering through the hallways. It had to be a dog, after all. A large dog. Maybe someone found a stray on their way to school, felt bad about leaving it in the downpour, brought it in and stashed it in the closet.
'Here, Fido!' I called gently, peering into the shadowed recess of the tiny room. 'Poochie?'
I heard a shifting, and the rumbling breathing became slightly more labored. Maybe this dog was hurt. I took a couple of tentative steps toward it and the breathing became a rumbling growl. A large part of the wall seemed to detach itself from the shadows. I was thinking then that it must in fact be an extremely large dog, until the shadow seemed to slowly unfold itself. It clambered out from between the shelves and towered above me, just outside the reach of the dim light.
The animal smell grew stronger as the thing came nearer, but there was also a cloying undertone like flowers or nectar. It was an almost familiar scent and may have been pleasant were it not for that beastly wet smell. Together they formed a pungent concoction of rot, a smell that I could nearly taste as the shadow thing grew nearer.
It grew closer still, and as it came closer toward the reach of the hazy light I could see that this was no bear. Decidedly not. The head was nearly all mouth -- I could tell from the light glinting from its teeth. Such large teeth it had. It made a wet slithering sound as it moved across the floor, still rumbling. I think I saw a tentacle.
A word on advice from adults, briefly: most grownups are quick to dispense information on all sorts of situations that they feel will have an impact on the lives of their children. Examples include not speaking to strangers, eating all of your vegetables, not standing directly in front of the microwave when it's running, and not sitting so close to the television. All great pearls of wisdom that they have gleaned from their collective years on this planet, I am sure.
All perfectly useless in a situation like this.
Neither of my parents, none of my teachers, had ever sat me down and said 'Alright, look, this is what you do in the event that you are shut in a broom closet with a monster.'. Utterly useless. None of their fire drills or emergency preparedness procedures had conditioned me for this.
I backed away, groping blindly behind me for the door. Had the broom closet grown? How was it possible that I had not yet reached the door? Sweatily I scrabbled for the elusive door and my freedom, my panic rising. The thing advanced.
My heart was beating so fast that I felt like one massive palpitation, my breath hot and stuck in my throat. I couldn't scream. The rotting flower stench surrounded me, invaded me.
The monster was close enough to be in the dim pool of light now. I jerked my head to the side, not wanting to see but catching a glimpse all the same: those giant teeth, thick matted fur, tentacles, yes, spiny and quivering, a swath of material covered in dots. Drool glistened on those sharp teeth, framed by a predator mouth with rigid lips. The rumbling grew louder. Tentacles were raised, forming a ghastly halo around the beast.
I think I did scream then and propelled myself backward, slamming into the door. My frantic hand finally found the doorknob and I wrenched it, tumbling myself out into the corridor. I rolled and sprung back up, slamming the door back into the frame. I then collapsed against it, shaking, head pounding, grateful for that uncommon burst of agility.
From the other side of the door came a gurgling sound. Laughter? Was that thing laughing at me?
I spun back toward the closet, momentarily enraged, my fear forgotten for a tiny second.
But those teeth. Those huge and glistening teeth.
Let the monster laugh.
At least it hadn't gotten me. I breathed a sigh of relief. Then my mind flipped back to that piece of dotted material. Monsters don't wear clothes...It must have gotten someone, then!
I fled down the corridor, intent on finding help, an adult, maybe five, to take this thing on and get it out, maybe exterminate it. Halfway to the office I paused. Tell them what, exactly? How should I go about sounding this alarm?
'Excuse me, but there's a monster in the broom closet' just didn't seem to cut it. This was, of course, the truth, but I didn't see this statement motivating any adult into action. A bear, then? Not likely, I decided after a moment of consideration. After all, I had been in the closet with it and this had not even seemed plausible to me. Dog, then. A big rabid foaming dog locked in the closet.
I ran the rest of the way to the office and peddled my rabid dog story. It was hard enough getting them to believe that, but eventually they assembled a small team and headed down the corridor to the broom closet.
Where, I'm sure you've already surmised, they found absolutely nothing. Zip, zero, didn't even comment on the wet animal flower funk, even though the tiny room absolutely reeked of it.
I was given a lecture on lying and two detentions for causing such a fuss and sent to my third hour class. I was in disbelief, stunned by the events as much as I was about the fact that it was only third hour. Hadn't I just spent five years in that broom closet?
I headed off to History in a daze, still worrying over that beast, now on the loose and at large. Not to mention the unfortunate victim it had already breakfasted upon. Some poor soul who would undoubtedly be dubbed as missing. The adults, poor clueless things, would form a search party and put up posters, never suspecting that the student in question had met their unfortunate end at the hands (tentacles) of a monster in the broom closet down the gymnasium corridor.
I sat in class and shivered, aware at how close I had come to being that missing child and thankful for my sheer luck. I could still smell that sickly sweet flower decay bouquet, and I shivered again.
'Cold in here, isn't it? Such a dismal day.'
I jumped at the voice from beside my desk and looked up. It was my History teacher, Mrs. Partridge.
'Oh! I didn't mean to startle you!' she laughed her low gruff laugh.
I noticed for the first time how big her teeth were.
How long and thick her hair, today slightly matted from the rain.
That thick flower smell that had seemed so briefly familiar in the broom closet.
She smiled again with her big teeth and walked to the front of the room.
'Sorry for being late, guys. I was detained unexpectedly.' she apologized to the class, smoothing down her polka dotted dress.

Author's Note

I welcome reviews and such, please!

Reviews

[Peninsula Pariah]

Good read.. love the ending!

[JLGottschalk]

Thank you, I'm glad that you enjoyed it!

[A. H. Pinley]

anymore... She was a (MEAN GIRL). See if you can ditch the parentheses. I like the door you open at the end of your piece. Keep with it...

[JLGottschalk]

Thank you, I appreciate the read and review!

[RobertLA]

Nicely done! It's not often I can read fiction about teens or pre-teens without cringing (due to the writing, not the situation). Gotta say, you did pretty well with this, especially with the ending.

[JLGottschalk]

Thank you! I wasn't quite sure about the ending myself. I knew where I wanted it to go, but I wasn't sure how far to take it. I think I made it obvious enough without spelling it out. Thank you so much for the read and the review.