They attack you out of the corners of the room. I've known that from the time I was five years old. The monsters always attack you out of the corners of the room.
I was like most kids from the first years of the TV generation, most boys anyway. I was addicted to those cheesy 50's and 60's sci/fi monster movies. They came on late every afternoon, TV shows hosted by some ham actor dressed vaguely like a mad scientist/ vampire/ hunchback. I was probably too young to be watching those films, even as low key as the frights and ridiculous the special effects were. Especially watching them by myself while mom tended the housework and my baby sister. But not too young to realize the truth about the monsters. The very, very real monsters.
They attacked the people in those movies out of the corners. You watch your next horror movie, especially the classics, very carefully and you'll see what I mean. The scene will show the intended victim, alone, sometimes out in the open but most times in a closed area. The victim will be moving about; probably even be aware of a Deadly Beastie lurking nearby, but oblivious to where the creature actually was. The camera shifts to show a close-up of that horror, somewhere near to the victim but still unseen. Then back to a wider shot of the victim, who will then turn in just the right direction just in time to see the monster lunge out and attack them- attack them from "off camera", attack them from the corner of the room!
This "corner" of course is against the "forth wall", the audience perspective side of the movie screen. So the monster would be coming from the same side of the set as where the cameras would be. Because coming from "off camera" added to the scariness of the monster; it wasn't as scary if you saw the creature just walk up casually to the victim before they attacked, was it?
The scare was the important part. I soon realized the rules of monster attacks:
1) Attack out of the corners, where they can't see you lurking.
2) Don't attack until just as they see you.
3) Wait for them to scream.
THAT's how the monsters feed, you see. They need the FRIGHT and the SCREAM!
I never stayed in a room alone unless I could hug the walls. Especially the corners. Can't sneak up on me if I occupied their hiding spot, after all. They also didn't attack if you were with someone, so I followed my mom everywhere, no matter how it bothered her. As for bedtime, well, we all knew monsters were in the closets or under the bed. Most kids spent long, fretful nights waiting for the horrors to come creeping out and attack. But I had them beat at their own game: I slept on my stomach, head (and eyes) buried in the pillow. I learned to wake with my eyes still closed, in case some THING was waiting for me to open my eyes? And SEE!
Paranoid? Maybe. But I slept better than any of my friends did, let me tell you.
Monsters are actually weak. They can't attack you, devour you, rip you up, unless they surprise you first. If they don't get that FRIGHT from you, they don't have the strength to kill you. I grew bold enough to step away from the walls, but never so far away I couldn't see the walls; see the corners. And I watched for them, waited for THEM-
And eventually? I saw one.
The first one came at me in the boy's rest room in elementary school. I never went by myself unless I was desperate, and then I chose the urinal closest to a wall. Closest to a corner. So, HE finally found me there, coming out of a corner behind me, sidling up with my back almost turned but not enough to see him first approach. Whispering vague sarcasms and disparagements aimed to frighten and dishearten me. I was frozen, in spite of myself, when I heard his whisper; I knew what he wanted. I knew he needed me to turn around to see him, see him and scream!
I closed my eyes and spun around, willing myself not to look, not to scream, not give him the strength to attack. I expected him to roar and terrify me? Instead, I heard him sputter. I opened one eye, then the other. I faced a gray, pulsing blob half my size. Flabby arms were swiping at where a face should have been, batting at liquid- MY liquid; I had peed on the thing when I whipped around before zipping up!
The short gray gelatin shook its excuse for a head (that bulb was on top of the space where shoulders should be, so it had to be a head) to clear off the last of my pee and opened its watery eyes. It stared up at me with an indignant air and opened a slash of a mouth to spit out equally indignant words:
"How DARE you attack me, you miserable worthless worm! I am your better, your nightmare, a thing not to be trifled with! I am the- ARE YOU LISTENING TO ME?!?"
I was listening, but I was also struggling to keep a straight face. The thing was frightening, at first glance. Even when covered in piss. But the wheedling, high pitched voice coming from the pulsing, puke-like blob was less than scare-worthy. Still, it was doing its poor little best.
"How dare you look at me with less than terror!" it continued to rant, though its voice was only growing more squeaky than sinister the louder it raged. "I know your secrets! I know your terrors! I am THE CREEPING DOUBT!" And with that it raised its squishy form up as tall and terrifying as it could- which was not much more than it had been.
It was as pathetic as it was comical. Not being able to help myself, I exploded into a cascade of helpless laughing? and at the sound of my laughter, the thing let out a strangled gurgle of pain and shock- and vanished! Gone in a puff of greasy smoke?
That's when I realized I had the answer: Laughter! I had the weapon the monsters could not fight against. Laughter, the anti-scream, the positive that banishes the negative. So, I watched for them after that, hunted them, did my best to see them. And when I did, when I do, I laugh- laugh!
I've learned to ignore the stares, the judgmental reactions from others about my sudden outbursts. Especially from family, like if we watched those old horror shows together and I would laugh my head off at the scariest scenes. I had to laugh to protect us, you see; because the monsters knew I was on to them and kept coming for me. Knew I was slaughtering their kin by the thousands with my laughing, kept trying to sneak up on me and attack me when I wasn't expecting them. Kept trying to attack me out of the corners.
I was shunned a lot growing up. I didn't mind, I needed to be vigilant for the monsters. I always managed to be the student with the desk in the corner of every class room, get the table closest to a wall at lunch, sat with my back to the window on the bus.
Or the subway, when I grew up. The subways were the worst, especially late at night when I would be all alone and there would be those brief few moments when the train arrived and I had to step away from the wall and rush into the car and into a corner of the car- that's when they'd try to rush at me out of the darkness at the end of the platforms, out of the tunnels. That's why I never stopped laughing, even if I actually felt scared.
Because I was.
I am.
And I've been that way from childhood to old age; a muttering, giggling vigilante.
Their attacks are so relentless; I realized I couldn't save you all. That's why I had to make sacrifices. Oh, no one important, no one innocent; just the human monsters. Muggers, rapists, dealers; they would disappear around me. From subway platforms, parks, deserted streets. No women, of course, never women. Women are attacked way too often in the movies, and real life. It wouldn't be fair. So, of course, I let the monsters get the guys? I just have to stifle the laughter until the slaughter is over.
That's why you found me near that mugger's body in the park the other night. I didn't kill him. I mean, really, does five-foot four little pudgy me look capable of biting half of a guy's head off? Or that meth-head biker you locked me up with in here that first night; could I have ripped off both his arms like that? Shoved one of them up his... well, do I look like I could?
And since I've been locked up alone since then, how do you explain the bloodbath in the other cells last night?? I tried yelling at them to huddle in the corners and keep their eyes shut. Or at least keep laughing, like I did all alone in my cell. That wino in the cell across from mine-who thinks he's Justine Bieber- he never stopped laughing, and he's still with us.
In fact, detective, I appreciate that you've got the lights turned up in our interrogation room, here. I was expecting the old spotlight lamp on me bit and the rest of the room dark. But you might want to tell your buddies on the other side of that mirror behind you to turn up their lights, 'cause I wouldn't be surprised if they've got guests coming out of the corners of THEIR room and? yup, there goes the screaming...
END