Sandman

We spend about half of our lives in nighttime. True, that can vary depending on where you live, but it's about right.

That's a long time to be afraid.

Many children are afraid of the dark. However, I have yet to meet one afraid of the day. That raises a big question of why? There isn't anything there that isn't there during the day, or is there. During night, imaginations go unbridled.

The result is often a new reality, so suddenly beasts are under the bed and ghosts in the closet.

The prayers don't help either. Should I die before I wake? Boy does that build confidence.


"Now I lay me down to sleep. I pray the lord my soul to keep. Should I die before I wake. I pray the lord my soul to take," said the little boy just before his bedtime.

He crawled into bed and his mother flicked the lights out just before she headed to her night shift job.

He closes his eyes and begins to fall asleep. The bed moves. There is a growling sound coming from underneath the bed. The boy now wide awake sits upright and his eyes shoot open.

He grabs his baseball bat near his bed and clutches it tightly in his fingers. He looks about the room with amazing alertness. Something is moving just beyond the foot of his bed. He spins around.

No longer able to take the fear he cries out for his dad. After the third squeal for him, his dad, hobbling from drink, stammers into his room.

"Dad there is something in the room!"

His father hits the light switch and a bright white light floods the room. The father takes a minute to let his eyes adjust and screamed, "I don't see a Goddamned thing!"

"It was over there," the boy points over toward the edge of the bed.

"Damn it son. It was just a fucking sheet. Listen if you don't get your ass to sleep within five minutes you will have something to fear!"

It was settled, the lights went out and the boy tried to go back to sleep.

He closed his eyes.

There was a loud bang in the closet. Once again the boy grabbed his bat. He was determined not to call his father again.

There was a shattering noise in the closet. It was followed by a blast of cold air from nowhere.

Clinching his bat tight he began to walk toward the closet. Then, when he got to the door he grabbed the knob and hesitantly began to turn it. He threw the door open violently and began to take swings with the bat. This produced an even louder noise.

His father threw the door to his room open and hit the light switch with such speed that his son was still in mid-swing when his father called out, "What in the hell are you doing?"

The boy was humbled, his lip began to quiver and he was fighting back tears, "I was trying to kill the ghosts to make you happy."

"What the fuck!"

The father pushed his son to one side and examined the damage. Holes in the wall, several fragile objects shattered and what will easily be a weekend worth of repairs.

He picked up his son by the armpits and threw him down on the bed. "What the fuck were you trying to do!?"

The son was terrified and in a small, pathetic voice, muttered, "I just wanted to kill the ghosts daddy, kill the ghosts, that's all please don't…"

Before he could get another word out the father raised his fist and brought it down on his jaw, "Kill the ghosts!? Kill the ghosts!? What ghosts you fucking idiot? You fucking coward!" he punched him again, "You little twerp you had better go to sleep this time or I will break your goddamned nose, you hear me!"

His father stormed out of the room, shut the door and killed the lights. All the way down the hall he could be heard crying out, "Kill the ghosts!?"

It wasn't difficult for him to go to sleep after that. He was feeling dizzy from the shots anyway so, he slept like a baby.

The next day was a Saturday so he got to sleep late, which he needed to get rid of the dizziness. Even after getting up at 11:00 the room was still spinning a little and he had a killer headache which his mother gave him medicine to quell.

The official explanation for his injuries was that he obtained the injuries while swinging the bat. His mom wouldn't believe that daddy had hit him so he went with his father's story.

But soon enough, bedtime came again.

Tonight though, there were no ghosts and the young lad had no difficulty drifting off into dreamland.

Shortly after he dozed off his father arrived home, obviously straight from the bar. He was quite drunk and decided to, despite the time, clean up the closet.

He managed to creep into the room and into the closet without waking up his son. He began to scoop up the various broken items when the door closed in on him. Since there was no knob on the inside of the door, he had no way out.

He dropped what he had picked up and began to pound on the door and scream for all he was worth. "Where is that stupid fucking kid, usually he wakes up {belch} over just about any damn thing. Where is heeeeee?!"

He continued to pound away at the door.

His son did awake. The demons were in his closet again. He grabbed the bat. He crept over to the door. The pounding only got louder. He could make out the demon yelling to be let out. He raised the bat.

The door was thrown open.

The boy began to swing wildly. His father, in his drunkenness, didn't even see the licks coming. He could only groan and cuss as the shots came wailing in. His son, in his state of terror, could only see the demon in the closet and didn't realize what he was really hitting.

One week later…

The funeral for the father was simple, plain and rather quiet. Very few people came out for the funeral. Since the family wasn't very wealthy, they really couldn't afford a big funeral anyway.

The abuse was only later discovered. However, it was still assumed that the child had murdered his father. With intent.

The child spent a large portion of his life in a mental hospital. He didn't totally break free of the mental health system until mid-adulthood. He had to first recall the memories and then face them, a time-consuming and very painful task.

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12 Responses to Sandman

  1. NiGhTmIsTrEsS says:

    holy shit raven. thats really good!

  2. jessica says:

    this is really good i loved it!

  3. nobody important says:

    the bastard father got what he deserved

  4. Reality Bites says:

    This was fantastic. A piece of awesome writing

  5. Nicole says:

    nice story. no really, i liked it alot.

  6. Arachne says:

    whoa…that is awesome and if you ask me the bastard got what he deserved. awesome story, i love it! great job!
    ~Arachne

  7. RougeInuyasha says:

    It's Karma.
    "What comes around goes around…what goes up must come down…"

    Basic Physics.

    If you mean to a person..God finds a way…and will show justice..but maybe..the devil went alittle to far on this one..yeah right…

    "If you show darkness…darkness will find a way back to just a thousands times stronger…"

    Darkest Blessings

  8. deryns says:

    dude this story is really f.ucking awesome, i really liked it, that asswipe got what he deserved.

  9. Danni says:

    that is really good…i read it during science class and i almost cried…half the class read it and they all said it was one of the most awsome things they have ever read…

  10. Cerberus says:

    yep. like rouge said. Karma, what sin you do will come back to haunt you….however what i found shocking was not the story but the fact that these kinds of people who beat and yell at there kids are real and even kill there own kids while beating them. However, good one raven.

  11. Ashley says:

    wow…..that's all that i can say at this point..wow

  12. Sarah says:

    That was very amusing,the drunken father had got what he deserved.

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