Allen watched his mother look out the window everyday and Allen knew what she was waiting for. His mother had started believing her own lies that her husband was coming home.
“How come I can’t go outside and play with my friends?“ Allen asked his mother.
“Its not safe Allen. There are bad people out there.”
“How come daddy is out there mommy?”
“He’s working.”
“Alone?!?”
“No, he’s not alone.”
“Is he helping the bad guys, is daddy one of the bad guys?”
“I surely hope not! Now go play.”
Allen went off to play leaving his mother sitting in the front windowsill. He grabbed his jacket and decided to go out and play on the swing set his daddy built him last summer. He hadn’t been outside since the day his daddy didn’t coming home. He sat on the swing and pushed off. The swing was squeaky, he must find out where his daddy went so he can fix the swing. Allen stopped swinging after a while because of the constant squeaking noise and moved onto his trucks in the dirt pile next to the garden. He started to build a mountain of dirt when he heard a crash and his mom screaming.
“Mommy?!?” screamed Allen and waited a second for his mom to respond. She didn’t respond so Allen ran inside with his dad’s bat in hand. When he went inside, the first thing he noticed were tiny pieces of glass on the floor in front of the picture window where his mom was sitting.
“Mommy, please answer me!” Allen yelled with a hint of panic in his voice. He went into the living room. He found his mom laying on the ground covered in blood and biting her neck was a tall man that he only recognized as his father because of the shirt he was wearing. It was the shirt he bought his daddy for Christmas.
“Daddy, you finally came home! What happened to Mo….” was all Allen could get out. His dad looked up as soon as he started talking. He was grayish and his eyes weren’t the shade of blue like Allen’s anymore. Now they were red with giant black circles in the center.
“DADDY… what happened to you?” asked Allen. His daddy let go of his wife and stood up. His eyes never left Allen’s. The next thing Allen knew his daddy was lifting him up against the wall and it didn’t feel like his daddy.
“Please don’t hurt me, Daddy” was the last thing Allen said. The next thing Allen knew his daddy was screaming in his face and biting him.
Allen woke up screaming. His mom came running in prepared for the worst. When she leaned nothing bad was happening she ran to her son’s bedside. Another bad dream.
She looked in the cabinet for some treats to help put him back to sleep and sighed, not only because she knew there was nothing there, but because she did not know which way her husband had headed when he went out to look for food eight days earlier.