He approaches with caution, stops dead, the fear in his eyes the lurch in my throat that wants to protect him from his own imagination but mesmerized by it, too. Once upon a time the frightful unknown was not abstract. It was a literal dark hole you couldn’t see the other side of.
“There’s monsters in there.”
I don’t confirm or deny it, instead try to science it, be a good steward of empirical thought, parent out the nightmare with reason.
“Do you want to check? I’ll hold your hand.” He doesn’t. “I’ll go. Wait here.”
I tap the flashlight on my phone, duck my head and slip into the cool dark. It’s neat. The kind of place I’d love as a teen. But the further I go, the clearer it becomes, it’s not clear if it will ever end.
“Mama, come back. Mama.”
“MAMA!”
I wonder for a moment what it’d take to be a monster — the kind of mother who in the darkness would scream bloody murder and scar her child for life.
“I’m coming.”
I retreat and blink in the bright sun, standing tall and telling him I didn’t see any monsters but I couldn’t see the end. I show him the pictures, the evidence that proves nothing. He regards them warily, and me too, like some of the dark rubbed off on me ope, sorry kid, it was there already though I see the relief, too. We talk around monsters.
Life has lots of dark holes, caves and tunnels. Some you explore, some you steer clear.
It’s brave to know when you’re scared.
Listen to your fear.
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