MOM'S MONSTER

I awoke to the sound of Mom and Dad fighting. I
wished I had still been sleeping. I heard talk of
murder. Did Dad really want to kill her?

Chaos had begun without warning. Dad stormed out
of the house in anger that morning. Mom called her brother.
We needed to leave in a hurry. The adults
were in a furry.

I had been told that Mom was mentally ill.
I didn’t understand why she couldn’t treat it like
a cold and fix it with a pill.

That night I caught a glimpse of her monster.
I felt her daemons when she stood in
the middle of my Uncle’s living room saying “This room
gives me visions”.

I found it hard to sleep that night. I was full of
confusion and fright. The next morning Mom seemed
alright. Her monster was nowhere in sight. We took a walk.
She asked me to go back for her purse. I should’ve seen it
coming. Instead, I was too busy being polite and smiling.
I went back for her purse. When I got back to the corner
she was gone. Her disappearance confirmed my fears.
I was blinded by tears.

I went back to my Uncle’s house
and told him what happened. He called the rest of
the family and formed a search party. Mom was found
standing on the highway yelling at cars. She was brought
safely back to the house. Dad came later that day to take me home.

The next day we checked Mom into a place where she’d be
staying for a while. That’s when I understood that Mom
was mentally ill. She couldn’t be fixed with a pill.
This new insight filled me with fear. Mom’s monster
was here.