A Love Letter from the Boogeyman

My name is Nox, and I live under your bed.

You don't know this, of course; nightly rituals of checking beneath the bed for monsters left you in your youth, and for this I count myself grateful. You simply live your little life while I stay tucked safely out of sight and out of mind. You have long calls with your friends, and in so doing, you teach me that your name is Grace, you are twenty three, and your favorite movie is Fight Club, but "the book was infinitely better." You try on your favorite dresses, dance to music I've never heard. You're vibrant, unfiltered, and pure, and I believe this is what causes me to fall in love with you. I do not believe anyone could fault me for this, if only they knew you. If only they were where I am, watching your socked feet pace around your bedroom from beneath your rusted twin bed frame, hearing the things you say to no one but yourself. It's enough to drive a man insane with want; I'm very lucky, then, not to be a man as God designed.

My stretched, ashen limbs maneuver me, lithe and silent, through the shadows over which you rest your head. I will admit, it's rather cramped. I think of Vishus, whose host sleeps in a luxurious king suite, bed standing tall above the floor. I think of Crowley, who lives in closets. I think of you, and I smile, cracked lips stretching over pointed teeth. For you, my love, I will endure this coffin for an eternity, delegated to watching thin strips of sunlight cross the carpet of your room. For you, I will fold myself into this darkness until the sun swallows the earth, if only it means your cries would be the ones to bless my ears when heat and light envelop us all. It would be enough for me to remain here, content, forever -- but everything changes the night you catch me feeding.

It begins as it does every night; stillness permeates the dark of your room, and without peeking at the glow of your alarm clock I know that it is nearly two in the morning. The delicate machinations of our arrangement work on a fine routine, you see. Now I feel them, the distant tendrils of dreams, fragmented and ethereal, dancing lightly in your brain. If only you knew what your dreams truly are. To you, they are broken sequences of story, vague images that you can't explain, thoughts with no conclusions. To you, a mystery; to me, the very essence of life.

Shadows twist and morph as I maneuver my way out from beneath your bed. Slowly, so slowly and so silently, I creep and I crawl into the open air before rising to my full height to tower above your sleeping form. There you are, my beauty, my dreamer, nestled safely between down-soft blankets, streaks of leftover mascara smudged around your eyes and plush lips parted while you softly snore. There you are, dreaming in blissful oblivion. My eyes close and I inhale deeply, drinking in the warmth of your subconscious, letting your dreams flood my senses and wash away the dark residue of existence. In your dreams, I taste your very soul, the spark of a life that was bestowed upon you, but not me. I will always be a creature of darkness, delegated to shadows and corners and spaces under beds, but not you. Your warmth creeps into the air around you, and I feel it like the heat that rolls off of a furnace in December, and I crave it as if hypothermia was gripping me with its icy hands.

I step closer.

So soft and sweet your dreams are, filling me up with a life I've never known. I can't believe that Vishus and the others prefer nightmares to this. I see the rolling of wind through tall grass and emerald pines that stretch up to the heavens. I smell honeysuckle and wine, and your dream of summer plants an intoxicating warmth in my belly that spreads swiftly to every thin gray fingertip. I could almost reach out and grasp it. By my side, one skeletal hand twitches. I can feel your dreams, my lifeblood, sustaining me and drawing me nearer to their irresistible source. Your breath hitches and your hand twitches, and I wonder if you sense my presence. Vision swimming between the tranquility of your subconscious and your prone form nestled deep into oblivion, a thin smile plays at my lips.

I step closer.

There is nothing I can do to stop it. In your dreams, your full summer moon is shrouded by inky clouds. They blow in, slowly but insistently, and the warm breeze begins to chill us both. The smile slips from my face as your nightmare forms. No, my sweet, I plead, I beg in urgent silence. My fingers close on empty air as if to grasp those sweet, fleeting moments, but they have gone, leaving behind them dissonant whispers and a cold, dense fog. A petrified whimper rises from your throat, and you toss in your bed, and the nightmare swirls unchecked. I grimace, bending forward so that my face nearly hovers above yours, and drink down the terror of your mind. It is the one sweet act I can do for you, my love, to devour your nightmares so that they cannot haunt you when you wake. Despite the chills in my bones and the wobble in my stomach, I swallow them whole and keep them safely trapped inside. I do this because I love you, and it is because I love you that I make this grievous error:

I step closer.

A creak in the floorboard beneath me shatters your restless sleep, and your eyes flutter open only to lock on mine, where a shaft of moonlight has fallen across my face, just inches from yours. Starkly illuminated, you see sunken, gauzy white eyes and the deep shadows of hollow cheeks. The skin that stretches across my skull glints silver and steel in the moonlight, that of it that isn’t obscured by a tangled mass of black hair. For the first time, you see me.


We hold each other's gaze for what could be a split second or an eternity -- I do not know or care which, only that I am looking into your eyes, wide with horror and the warmest color of rust. You are too paralyzed to scream, save a quiet rasp that escapes your frozen lips. A tender smile stretches across my face, before splitting into a toothy grin, a scrap of light falling upon a row of sharp white triangles. You gasp, the spell of terror broken, and dash to turn on your bedside lamp.

I am, of course, gone when you turn back to where I was standing. Softer than shadows, quicker than flies, I dart back beneath your bed, but not before your eyes catch sight of the shadow of my foot retreating to safety. You're on your feet before you even know what you're doing, you brave, precious thing. Lights fly on, and I hear the soft thump of your hands and knees hitting the carpet, hear the distant click of a flashlight, but I am gone, long gone by the time you begin your search. Under your bed, you find only dirty socks, empty water bottles, and a shoebox containing all your deepest, darkest secrets. You check for my presence six times that night, and another three the next day. I can't help but feel touched by this display, but something like me does not survive very long without the ability to remain unseen. The shadows that birthed me give me shelter, and in the nights following, you do not see me. Nonetheless, you know that I am there. Your nightmares tell me.

What agony it is, my sweet dreamer, to taste your nightmares every night, to see your fear take hold. At first, I try to be strong. It will not do to scare you a second time, lest you leave this place and go somewhere that I cannot find you. And yet, each night that passes, I long to stoop by your headrest and run my long fingers across your feverish forehead, to coax the nightmares away, to eat them alive so that they can never hurt you again. And each night that passes, I fold myself into your cramped underbed, waiting and wasting and wanting. Three nights pass, nights of starvation and isolation, nights in which we both lie awake, aware of the other's presence but refusing to breach the space between. Three nights in which your fragmented nightmares twist in your brain, haunting me, taunting me. I am paralyzed by indecision. My next step could lose you forever, and then what would I be, drifting endlessly from bed to bed, searching for a love that has fled from me? But I once again underestimate you, your bravery, your light.

It is on the third night that you speak to me.

"Are you there?"

It is a simple question, but in it, I hear everything. I hear the soft quake of your voice that barely breaks a whisper. I hear your determination, your strength, and perhaps what makes my stomach flip the hardest, your acceptance that I exist. The silence stretches long and sharp, but finally, I bring myself to answer. A throat unused produces a sound like gravel under the tire of a sedan.

"Yes."

Your soft gasp penetrates the air only for quiet to reign once more. Your pause is even longer than mine. The seconds that pass seem to pile up on top of me, like rocks, or like a collapsing rusted twin bed frame, and then there is a quiet click as you turn on your bedside lamp.

"Can you come out?"

Oh, my love, I will replay those words until the end of time. How my heart soars at the thought of removing this barrier, of standing before you in truth and light. Slowly and carefully, I slide from beneath your bed once more and rise, seven feet of gray monstrosity facing down your soft, pink form. Soft cotton shorts and an oversized tee shirt declaring your allegiance to the Foo Fighters make up your pajamas. Your champagne curls have won the battle tonight, bundled unceremoniously atop your head. You're sitting up in the darkness, coiled like a serpent, and the moonlight glints off the kitchen knife clutched in your grip. I look at it, and then at you. Even in this darkness, I can make out the yet darker shadows beneath your eyes that shine so dauntlessly. Your skin is clean of makeup, and it gives off a holy glow. I long to reach out and touch you, but your fear tastes like electricity and almonds. I stay where I am until you speak again.

"What are you?"

I peer down at your daring brazenness, the fire of my life, my sunshine and my moonlight. That same shimmering smile spreads, unbidden, across my sunken face.

"My name is Nox, and I live under your bed."