Monsters in Plain Sight

“Come on, Sally, it’s time for bed,” I said, taking Sally’s hand to lead her to her room.

“But Mom and Dad aren’t home yet, Anna.” She pulled back.

“I promised your parents you’d be in bed by 9. Besides, tomorrow’s Saturday; you’ll have plenty of time to spend with them.”

Sally finally agreed, albeit with a heavy sigh. When I was tucking her in, however, I thought I heard a noise downstairs.

“That’s just the monsters in the basement,” Sally said. “Daddy locked them up there.”

I smiled at what she said but was about to tell her to stay in bed while I investigated downstairs when I heard the front door open. Sally’s parents, Allison and Matt, were home. Sally ran out of the bedroom to greet them the second she heard their voices.

I was just about to leave when Allison said that Matt could give me a ride home. During the drive, he asked me whether Sally gave me any trouble. I had no complaints since she was a well-mannered child. But things took a weird turn when I mentioned to Matt about what Sally said about the monsters locked in the basement.

“Of course I locked them in the basement. It’d be troublesome otherwise.”

He sounded so serious that I questioned whether he was joking or not.

“You don’t believe that monsters are real?” Matt frowned.

“You’re joking, right?”

Matt avoided my question. He simply chuckled. “It’s funny, isn’t it? People so ardently believe in gods and demons, but rarely do they question the existence of monsters.”

Those words stuck with me for the rest of the night. When I arrived home, Granny knew something was weighing on my mind, but I shrugged it off and told her it was nothing. Before I knew it, the morning sun was sneaking into my room as I lay on my back with my eyes fixed on the ceiling. I then remembered something Granny once said: “Monsters have always been around us, hon. Not many of us can see them, but they are indeed out there.”

I got off my bed and rushed to the living room. Granny was already awake and with a cup of tea in her hand, as always. She greeted me with a smile warmer than the morning sun as I sat next to her.

“I take it you’re ready to talk?” she asked. Granny knew me too well.

“Do you remember what you told me about monsters a long time ago?”

“Yes, hon. And there’s something you should know, now that you’re old enough.”

My eyes widened as Granny revealed something that was hidden from me all my life.

“I’m a witch?”

“Yes, your mom made me promise not to undo the spell she cast on you to seal your powers until you were old enough. And I think the time has come for you to unlock your powers.”

I told Granny what Matt told me the other night and asked her whether he could be a wizard. Granny frowned for a moment. “That can’t be right… A wizard or witch would either seal or destroy a monster, not lock it away in the basement. There’s something else going on in that house, Anna.”

“Do you think he’s a monster?”

“Perhaps…” Granny thought for a moment. “That entire family could be monsters for all we know.”

Allison and Matt arrived in our town only two weeks ago, so no one knew much about them. We had to be careful. Granny soon devised a plan for me to figure out what was going on. She undid the spell that was sealing my powers and gave me an amulet that would cloak them. No monster would know that I’m a witch as long as I wore it.

“But how will I know if they are monsters?”

“You’ll see their true faces hidden behind the human facades. Don’t react if you see them.”

I went to babysit Sally the following day. There, I noticed Allison’s and Matt’s true forms. They were hideous under their human masks—their cheeks sunken, their eyes hollow, and their mouths so wide they stretched from ear to ear. I felt chills run throughout my body.

Once they were gone, I placed Sally under a sleeping spell and went to the basement. There, I found the real Allison and Matt, as well as two other women, all bound and gagged, their arms and legs shackled to the walls. I undid their chains with my magic and found out that the real Allison was a witch, and that the other two women were her sisters. The monsters were keeping Sally hostage to syphon Allison and her sisters’ powers.

Allison asked Matt to take Sally and stay at a nearby hotel while we dealt with the monsters. When the fake Allison and Matt finally arrived that night, the four of us used our combined strength to destroy them. The family was reunited once the monsters were dealt with, and I returned home to hug Granny tight. It was the longest hug we ever shared.