They lived deep beneath the floorboards, or so they told me, deep enough to feel the pulse of the world and certainly too deep for little girls like me to try and dig up. Still I tried to reach them, my little under-friends as I called them.
They first started speaking to me after my parents had gotten into a worse argument than usual that ended in one of the neighbours smashing the kitchen window and threatening to call the police on them. I was hiding in a large cardboard box that was also my wardrobe when I saw one of the floorboards lift up and a withered arm poke out.
There were beady amber eyes further down in the dark that spotted me and the arm withdrew, gently bringing the floorboard back down. I thought that was the end of it until the board just in front of me lifted up and I was properly introduced to my first and closest under-friend.
Names didn't mean anything to them and they refused to even hear mine but somehow we always knew who was speaking to who. In hindsight the little cloud of spores they released whenever they opened their mouths might also have something to do with the mild telepathy...
Regardless, we were friends and they held my hand through countless sleepless nights of loud arguments and thrown objects until one day they decided to take action. They told me that friends helped each other and that they wanted to help me.
All I had to do was close my eyes and wait for them in the living room. And I did. I heard a few faint thumps around me and felt something splash against me cheek but I assumed the ceiling was leaking again. One of them held my hand and led me outside where the police found me about forty minutes later.
I was covered in someone else's blood and the house behind me was eerily silent. I didn't find out whose blood it was until I was old enough to ask for the file and read the full story. Read how my parents managed to brutally murder each other with their bare hands.
I knew it was a lie though. My under-friends said they'd help me and they killed my parents. Sure I went to much nicer foster parents who went on to adopt me but I have a debt hanging over my head. I don't know when they'll ask to collect but I know they will.
Because friends help each other and the floorboards in my new apartment are starting to move.
They first started speaking to me after my parents had gotten into a worse argument than usual that ended in one of the neighbours smashing the kitchen window and threatening to call the police on them. I was hiding in a large cardboard box that was also my wardrobe when I saw one of the floorboards lift up and a withered arm poke out.
There were beady amber eyes further down in the dark that spotted me and the arm withdrew, gently bringing the floorboard back down. I thought that was the end of it until the board just in front of me lifted up and I was properly introduced to my first and closest under-friend.
Names didn't mean anything to them and they refused to even hear mine but somehow we always knew who was speaking to who. In hindsight the little cloud of spores they released whenever they opened their mouths might also have something to do with the mild telepathy...
Regardless, we were friends and they held my hand through countless sleepless nights of loud arguments and thrown objects until one day they decided to take action. They told me that friends helped each other and that they wanted to help me.
All I had to do was close my eyes and wait for them in the living room. And I did. I heard a few faint thumps around me and felt something splash against me cheek but I assumed the ceiling was leaking again. One of them held my hand and led me outside where the police found me about forty minutes later.
I was covered in someone else's blood and the house behind me was eerily silent. I didn't find out whose blood it was until I was old enough to ask for the file and read the full story. Read how my parents managed to brutally murder each other with their bare hands.
I knew it was a lie though. My under-friends said they'd help me and they killed my parents. Sure I went to much nicer foster parents who went on to adopt me but I have a debt hanging over my head. I don't know when they'll ask to collect but I know they will.
Because friends help each other and the floorboards in my new apartment are starting to move.
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