The Monster That Came to Breakfast

As the alarm clock began its electronic droning at 6:00am, so did the pain in Bob Evan's temples.  He didn't sleep well enough or long enough but he had a job to do so he pulled himself out of bed anyway.  His bare feet hit the carpeted floor and he put his arms out and stretched to pull the kinks out of his bones that had set in overnight.  He rubbed his eyes too, hoping they'd focus better as he woke up.  They did somewhat, at least well enough to get him to the kitchen for coffee. 

As he headed for the door he glanced back at the bed.  His wife Cathy was still sound asleep, her arm hugging her pillow close to her body.  He was jealous of her ability to sleep deeply.  It’s a skill he wished he had, or a skill that he wished he could get back.  There was a time when Bob slept just fine, but that was when his brain worked right.  That's not to say that there was anything wrong with his brain, necessarily.  It just didn't work like it used to.  He was unsure though if it was because of the lack of sleep and stress in his life or if the lack of sleep and stress was caused by his inability to keep a coherent thought. 

Either way, there were days that he felt like he was going mad.  "But it’s nothing that coffee won't fix in the meantime," he thought as turned to head to the kitchen.  There was a time when Bob was out of bed at 6:00 before the alarm clock even went off, but that was when the lights were on, when all pistons were firing, when the ideas flowed from him like water from a spring.  Bob was a writer and ideas were his life's blood, however, they had stopped coming.  That, or his brain quit sending them and that portion of his brain where creativity lived just quit, if such a thing were possible.  Cathy swore it was just writer’s block, but Bob worried that it was something worse.  Even before he could think it he could see Arnold Schwarzenegger in his head saying, "it’s not a tumor."  He laughed to himself.  At least he still had his humor.  All writers got blocked sometime but this just kept hanging on.  He hadn't written anything in almost six months and he was worried that his publisher would drop him.  Every day he got up and tried to write and each day began with the same ritual of coffee and Captain Crunch.  If anything, he was a creature of habit.

As Bob made his way down the hall from the bedroom to the living room, he began to notice that the morning was not as quiet as usual.  He could hear sounds coming from beyond the living room in the kitchen.  A swinging door hung between the two rooms and Bob could see light coming from under the threshold.  He stopped for a moment near the couch and listened.  Was someone in the house?  He could hear dishes and silverware clanking and the definite sound of cereal being poured.  That's a specific sound he couldn't mistake, but the crunching and grunting sounded more like a dog was eating it.  Someone or something was in the kitchen. 

He turned to go back and wake Cathy, but stopped.  If it was an intruder it would be best if he could get them out before she woke up.  There was less chance of her being hurt that way.  Bob then turned to look for his phone, but remembered that he had left his cell on the kitchen counter to charge.  About a year prior he had made the decision to do without a land line and go completely cellular, a choice which he now regretted.  Before there had been a phone in the kitchen, living room, and bedroom, but now he only had the one cell phone.  Emergency assistance is only helpful if you can actually call them. 

With no way to call for help, Bob looked around the room for a weapon.  The warmly decorated living room however, did not provide anything that Bob thought he could sufficiently use to bash someone's skull in or stab them with.  He did find a vase though, and while it had been a present from his aunt, its unappealing floral design on a base of powder blue, made it the next best choice to a sledge hammer.  If the vase was smashed on a robber's head, at least he could tell his aunt that he got good use from it.  With the vase clutched firmly in his right hand, Bob moved to the door and slowly pushed it open. 

He expected to see some deranged lunatic, possibly a naked escapee from a local mental hospital, seated at his table eating his cereal, but that's what he saw.  Seated at the kitchen table, or at least squatting on the chair, was a large hairy Monster.  Bob froze in place as his brain tried to classify the creature he was seeing, tried someway to make sense of it.  He tried calling it a large hairy man, an orangutan, an ape, or even a gorilla but the best name for what he saw was Monster because his eyes had never laid eyes on anything like it. 

His mouth opened and he started to scream, or at least he tried to start, but he was unable to make any sound.  In hind sight Bob decided that this was a good thing because it most likely saved him from a sure and quick death. 

With his mouth gaping he stood and studied the Monster, who for the time being, seemed more interested in the cereal it had spread all over the table than it was in the strange man in pajamas who was trying to catch flies with his mouth. It had hair covering its entire body but it wasn't dark like a gorilla’s.  It was a dark yellow that turned almost black as it got closer to the skin.  Its arms were long but were thick like tree limbs and each ended with a large hand that looked more like a bear paw with fingers, and each finger ended in a long, pointed claw. 

Even with its size and terrible looking appearance, what struck Bob most about the Monster was its head.  It seemed a bit disproportionate to its body, just slightly larger than it should have been and it had a very pronounced brow, a bit like pictures Bob had seen of cavemen when he was younger.  The face in fact was one of the only places where there wasn't hair.  The Monster had thick lips that covered large yellow stained teeth that were visible every time it took another bite of cereal from its meaty hand.  It’s nose was tiny and almost not even there.  Except for a tiny nub above them, there were two slits in its skull where it sucked in air.  Then there were it’s eyes. 

Bob hadn't seen them at first because he had been so focused on the rest of the creature and also because it had been so focused on the cereal spread on the table in front of it.  Now, however, it was aware of Bob and it tilted it’s head back, fixing it’s eyes on Bob in the doorway.  They were large, larger than Bob had expected them to be and they were black, not just the pupils, but all of them, a deep shimmering black.  They seemed to look right through Bob and the hair on the back of his neck stood up. 

He wanted to run.  He couldn't scream but he hoped his legs would work.  To his horror he found that they wouldn't or at least couldn't make them move.  With an inability to flee he tried to remain still but he couldn't stop shaking.  Fear had immobilized him but the pent up energy was manifesting itself as an intense shaking that rattled his body.  The Monster looked him over from head to toe, grunted, and shrugging its shoulders settled down again to eating the cereal in front of it, it’s yellow teeth biting down on another handful of Captain Crunch.

With the Monster’s attention back on the cereal, Bob was able to calm himself enough that he could move his legs.  It was very little at first but he was able to back out of the room.  He did so as slowly and quietly as possible, letting the door swing shut with only a whisper.  He then carefully took three steps backwards, distancing himself slowly from the monstrosity in the kitchen.  As he took his final step, he realized too late that he was backing in to one of the dining room chairs.  Before he could correct his backwards course, his left leg struck the chair and he went off balance falling backwards over the chair and on to the floor.  His fall was neither graceful nor quiet and as he hit the carpet, he heard the table move in the kitchen.  There was a loud squeal of table legs being shoved across the tile and then a loud bang.  Bob guessed that the Monster had shoved the table in to the cupboards. 

As soon as he heard it, Bob felt a chill run through him as fear racked his body again.  The thing was on the move!  His mind raced and the only thought he could focus on was to get to Cathy.  He had to shut the bedroom door before that thing could get the both of them.  He rolled on to his knees and as he started to his feet, he saw a large clawed hand reach around the kitchen door and push it open.  He didn't wait to see the rest of it come in to the room.  He launched himself forward and ran down the hall.  He heard it growl as it pushed through the doorway and he guessed that it must have gotten stuck, at least a little, because the growling grew louder and crescendoed in to a roar that was either pain or anger.  Bob did not care to find out which as the sound only increased his need to get to Cathy. 

The door to the bedroom was still open but as he passed through it his speed worked against him and his shoulder crashed in to the door jamb sending a sharp pain shooting through his arm and up in to his neck.  He grabbed the door knob to keep his balance and turned to shut the door.  The Monster was lumbering down the hallway, its brow furrowed in anger, its lips pulled back from it’s stained teeth as it moved closer and closer to Bob.  He didn't wait for it to get any closer as he slammed the door shut and locked it. 

After turning the lock he wondered if it would do any good.  If the thing really wanted in, it was coming in.  Bob turned and ran towards Cathy.  His only thought was her safety and their escape.  As he neared her side of the bed, she sat up, her blonde hair a mess and her eyes half open. 

"Bob?"  She rubbed her eyes.  "What on earth are you doing?" 

For the first time he found that he had a voice. "Cathy, its here." 

"What's here baby?"  She finally opened her eyes enough to see that he was afraid.  "Oh my god!  What's wrong?" 

Bob looked back towards the door, expecting it to crack and explode open any second, but it didn't.  He didn't answer Cathy right away.  Instead he sat and stared at the door and listened.  He couldn't hear the Monster hitting the wall or the sound of anything outside the room.  Cathy placed her hands on his cheeks and turned him to face her. 

"What's the matter Bob?  You're scaring me." 

His eyes finally fixed on hers and he answered, "There's a Monster or something in the house.  It was in the kitchen eating but when it saw me it chased me down the hall."  The words came out faster than he intended.

She laughed.  "A Monster?  Really?  I think you're insomnia is finally catching up to you." 

She got out of bed and started for the door, but Bob grabbed her arm. 

"You can't go out there." 

"And why not?" 

"Because it will kill you.  It will kill the both of us." 

Cathy stopped and looked in to Bob's eyes.  She could see that he believed what he was saying, but she still moved towards the door.  "I don't know what you saw Bob, but there's no Monster." 

Bob tried to pull her back from the door but she shook him off and unlocked it.  The muscles in Bob's legs tightened as he prepared to run.  This must be what fight or flight feels like, he thought.  As Cathy pulled the door open Bob took in a deep breath.  As it swung wide, he didn't see anything, nothing but the hall way. 

She turned, with an incredulous look on her face.  "See?  Nothing there.  It must have been a dream or your imagination." 

He stepped in to the hall and examined the walls.  There were no marks, no signs that anything had shoved its way through here.  The only evidence of any kind of chase was the deep throbbing that he was now feeling in his shoulder. 

"Maybe your insomnia is finally causing a break in your writer’s block.  You have a hell of an imagination." 

"It wasn't my imagination," he said turning to look at her.  "I know what I saw."

From down the hall, Bob heard a loud crash.  He turned quickly to see if the Monster would be standing at the end of the hall.  To his relief, it wasn't. 

"What is it?” Cathy asked.

"You didn't hear that?" 

"Hear what?" 

Bob didn't answer.  He walked quickly down the hall and looked in to the living room.  Standing in front of the book case was a large wall of muscle and hair.  It was even larger when it stood completely upright.  It was pulling books from the book shelf and throwing them to the floor.  The particular shelf that it was emptying contained, or had contained all of Bob's published books.  The creature seemed to take wicked delight in slamming each novel to the floor like it was trying to destroy them. 

Bob heard Cathy approach behind him.  "What is it?" 

He turned to look at her with bewilderment in his eyes.  "You don't see that?" 

"See what?"

"That!"  He pointed back towards the hulking Monster, but when he turned around to face it again, it was gone, and so were the piles of books on the floor.  It was as if it hadn't happened.  Bob held his head in his hands and tried to stop the pain.  His temples were throbbing again.  He moved to his recliner and sat down.  "My god, what's happening to me?"

Cathy walked over and rubbed his shoulders.  "You're stressed out honey.  You don't sleep.  You barely eat, and the fact that you can't finish your current book is wearing you down.  Like I said, I think this is your writers block breaking.  If you think about it, you've been stuck for what, about a month now?  Maybe this is your imagination starting to run wild." 

Bob looked back at the bookcase.  He was sure of what he'd seen and he was damn sure he hadn't imagined being chased down the hall.  The pain and swelling in his shoulder told him that, yet there was no evidence that any of it had happened.  He reached up and took Cathy’s hand as she rested it on his shoulder.  "Maybe you're right.  It just that it felt so real." 

Cathy came around to the front of the chair and knelt in front of him.  She took his hands in hers and looked in to his eyes.  "Bob, you're tired, and stressed out because your deadline is coming with your publisher.  That's all this is.  You need to relax and try to write.  Maybe that's what this is.  Maybe this is your imagination giving you a way out, giving you a way to get passed the block."

Bob, looked in to her eyes too.  "But how does a huge, hairy, stinking Monster help me finish a murder mystery?" 

She laughed.  "I don't know, but maybe you need to write about him to get him to leave."  She patted his knees and stood up.  "I'm going to go change and head to the store to get some things for breakfast.  Why don't you go sit at your computer and see if you can't put this Monster down on paper?"  Cathy bent over and kissed him on his forehead and left him to work.

Bob went in to the den and sat at his desk.  He reached over and picked up the silver picture frame he kept by his computer.  It was a picture of him and Cathy.  He stared at it for a moment and thought, "as long as she believes in me, I can write." 

He powered on the computer and loaded up his word processing program.  He pulled up a blank page and typed the first thing that popped in to his head, "The Monster In My House."  He then sat and stared at the blank emptiness of the rest of the page.  He heard Cathy shower, heard her tell him she loved him, and heard her leave the house. 

He tried to concentrate.  He wanted badly to have several pages written by the time she returned but the words just didn't seem to come.  As he sat and stared, he became aware of the silence in the house.  He could hear the ticking of the clock and the hum and rattle of the ceiling fan.  His hyper awareness of his surroundings was as irritating to him as his inability to put one word after the other.  Then something broke the silence.

PLINK, PLINK, PLUNK!

The sound of someone hitting keys on the piano in the living room was just outside his office door.  Bob's hands started to shake.  He hadn't heard Cathy come home, but he was sure she had left.  He sat quietly and listened.  He tried to remain quiet so he could hear the slightest movement outside of his office.  If it was an intruder, it was also so they would not know where he was.  He sat for several minutes and heard nothing so he stood and started for the doorway.  He was almost to the door when he heard a loud disharmonic noise as something slammed down on several piano keys at once.  He started to step back and but forced himself forward. 

The piano sat in the living room against an adjoining wall to the office, but it was to the right of the doorway.  It was situated close enough to the corner that Bob could not see it from his position inside the office.  He moved forward slowly so as not to reveal his location too soon.  As the piano came in to view he saw the large, yellow haired Monster standing in front of it, staring at it quizzically with its dark, black eyes.  Its left hand raised high, clawed fingers outstretched.  As Bob peered further around the corner, the Monster brought its hand down forcibly on the piano causing a loud melodic bang that ended in wood splinters flying in to the air.  The impact must have hurt because the Monster tilted its head back and roared in pain.  Unlike earlier in the morning, Bob's legs worked this time and he backed quickly in to the office, slamming the door. 

As he locked the door he felt the impact of the creature hitting it.  It felt like the whole house shook.  Bob moved quickly behind his desk in an attempt to find a place to hide before the Monster knocked the door down.  He managed to get himself down under the desk as the Monster hit the door hit the door again.  There was the sound of cracking wood and the house shook again as the Monster began to pound over and over. 

Boom, Boom, Boom.

With each knock the door seemed to bow inwards, the wood straining at the lock and hinges.  Bob wondered how long it could hold out before the wood cracked and the door blew inward.  But then the thundering sound of the pounding faded.  It was quiet.  As the silence continued it permeated the room and for the first time in a long time things seemed clearer, more focused.  The fog that had clouded Bob's mind faded.  In the silence he wondered, "Why didn't the door break?  Why wasn't he being torn apart and eaten right now?"  He watched the Monster smash the piano.  Its meaty paw, with its devilishly long, sharp claws had splintered the wood easily.  Why not the door? 

Bob rose from up from under the desk and slowly crept towards the door.  He thought that maybe the Monster way baiting him, waiting.  Testing to see if he was still in the room.  If it was, the slightest noise could send it crashing through the door to use it large hands and claws to shred him like it had the piano.  He was certain that it intended to eat him too.  Instead of Captain Crunch it would be Bob Crunch.  The thought of it made him shudder. 

He made his way to the door without making a sound and reached out, touching the wood.  It was still smooth, intact.  There was no sign that it broken or stressed in any way.  He leaned forward and pressed his ear against the door.  He slowed his own breathing in an effort to be silent and listened.  He expected to hear heavy breathing as the creature pressed its own ear against the door to listen, but he heard nothing.  He then carefully put his hand around the door knob and turned it.  As he pulled the door open, no hulking mass of fur and muscle greeted him, no stinking breath or yellowed teeth.  The room beyond was empty.  Even stranger, the piano that Bob saw the Monster smash was intact and undamaged. 

Cathy was right.  The Monster, everything that had happened, it was all in his head.  It had all seemed so real but it hadn't been.  There was no damage to the piano or to the door.  It had to be exactly what Cathy had said.  His imagination was running wild. 

Bob stood there for a moment, running his hand across the keys of the piano then smiled.  The Monster wasn’t the only thing that had vanished.  The writer's block was gone too.  The story of the Monster began playing back like a movie in his mind.  He went back in to his office, sat and his desk and began typing.  The words flowed on to the screen like a rushing river.  He hadn't written like this in months and it felt good.  In no time at all he had typed several thousand words and had the entire story of the Monster down on paper.  He wasn't sure how he knew it, but he was sure that now that it's story was told, he wouldn't be seeing the Monster again. 

After typing the last sentence of the story he added a dedication.  While he normally only did this for his books it seemed appropriate for a short story in this instance.  "Thank you to my wife Cathy for her love and support, even when things got crazy."  He then saved the story to the hard drive and hit print.  He couldn't wait to share the story and the good news with Cathy.  As soon as it was finished printing he gathered up the pages and took them in to the other room.  Cathy would be getting back with the groceries soon. 

Bob waited patiently for his wife return but the minutes turned to hours and Cathy did not come home.  He put the pages of the story down on the table and picked up his cell phone.  He quickly punched her number in to the key pad and held the phone up to his ear but instead of the call connecting he heard, 'I'm sorry, but the number that you have dialed has been disconnected.'  Thinking that he misdialed, Bob keyed her number in again but was immediately met with the same message. 

The fact that she was not back yet made him scared, but not being able to reach her by phone scared him.  She should have been back by now and after hallucinating a Monster all morning he was worried that something more had happened to her than simply deciding to make a few extra stops. 

Without a way to reach her by phone he dialed another number, that of Polly Kitridge, Cathy's best friend.  The phone range twice and Polly picked up. 

"Hello?"

"Polly, this is Bob." He tried to remain calm but as he spoke his voice was shaky.

"Bob? what's wrong?"

"Have you seen Cathy today?  She left the house this morning to go grocery shopping and she hasn't come home yet.  I'm a little worried."

There was a pause before Polly answered.  "Bob, are you feeling alright?  I know you've been stressed out with your deadline."

"I have been, but I'm ok.  It's Cathy.  I can't find her."

Polly paused again, then asked, "Bob, who's Cathy?"

Time froze for Bob as Polly's words repeated over and over in his mind.  "Bob, who's Cathy?"

He must have stood there, trance like, for several minutes because he soon became aware of Polly urgently trying to get his attention. 

"Bob!  Bob!"

"I'm sorry Polly.  I need to go."

Bob hung up the phone and went back to his desk.  He picked up the printed pages of his story, went to the last page and read his dedication again.  "Thank you to my wife Cathy for her love and support, even when things got crazy."  He then picked up the silver picture frame on the desk that had held the photo of him and Cathy.  As he looked at it now it was only a picture of him on his trip to the Grand Canyon.  Cathy was not there.  She hadn't been there any more than she had been in the house that morning.  The writer's block really had messed with his head.  As he put the pages of his story in his top desk drawer, he remembered the advice Cathy had given him that afternoon, "maybe you need to write about him to get him to leave."  Real or not, she was smart woman.  Getting it down on paper worked, unfortunately, she was a type of crazy he could have lived with.