"Alright, boys!" Alfred's dad calls up, warningly. "Remember, 30 minutes until lights out!"
Alfred's house is different than Mathew's. They get to eat pizza in the living room in front of the tv, and go outside at night and play tag with glowsticks in the backyard, and stay up an hour later than Alfred's bedtime for the sleepover. They're all crammed into Alfred's room, Alfred and his cousin Kyle on the bed, Mattias and Matthew on an air mattress on the floor. James has already gone home and Kyle whispers conspiratorially that James can't sleep when he's not in his own bed.
Mathew wonders what that feels like, not being able to sleep unless you're in your own bed.
He shifts on the air mattress, and his Pajamas ride up a bit, and Mathew wiggles to pull them back down. They're too small, too high on the ankles and too short on the arms, he must have grown since cousin Lucille gave them to him, but none of the other boys seem to notice or care. In fact, the only thing they care about are the dinosaurs, and to Mathew's surprise, he isn't teased at all. Alfred approves of them, but says his rocketship jammies are better. Kyle gets teased a bit, because he doesn't wear jammies, just some old shorts to bed, but Mattias thinks that makes Kyle cool, anyways. Kyle's already a teenager ("I'm turning fourteen in six months!") but he's not that different than the rest of them. When Mattias asks if Kyle dates girls now that he's a teenager, Kyle snorts.
"Girls are gross! And besides, I'm too busy with rugby to worry about girls."
Mathew feels calmer after Kyle says that. He doesn't want to talk about things that happen after puberty. Mathew's thirteenth birthday isn't far off either.
"You're going to be a man, soon!" Papa had told him. "My little boy is all grown up."
Mathew doesn't want to be grown-up.
Alfred turns out the lights, and Mattias produces the beloved colour-changing flashlight, soaking up the impressed oohs and awes with pride. Finally, the final event of the evening starts. The part where they all tell scary stories. Alfred volunteers to go first (after a bit of bickering with Mattias and Kyle, ending when Alfred announces "It's MY sleepover, so I get to go first!")
Alfred tells a scary story about a clown statue that isn't a statue at all. Mathew feels cold in his stomach as Alfred describes the feeling of always being watched, and shrinks back under the blanket its too hot to be wearing.
Kyle's goes next ("I'm the oldest!") with a scary story about a girl who wakes up to a scary noise, but her dog licks her hand and reassures her, so she goes back to sleep.
"But when she went Into the bathroom the next time she woke up, the dogs was dead!" Kyle itones creepily, "And on the mirror, it's written in blood, humans can lick too."
Mathew recoils, curling deeper under the blanket, feeling phantom tongues on his body, a feeling of wetness that wasn't really there on his groin. There's prickling under his skin again, bugs trying to escape.
"Me next!" Mattias volunteers, and Mathew bites his lip so he doesn't beg him not to say it. He's almost thirteen, it's not cool to be scared of ghost stories.
Fortunately, Mattias tries a bit too hard, and a story that could have been scary turns out kinda funny instead.
"So the bigger demon ate the first one?" Alfred checks. "Then nothing bad even happened to the guy who made a deal!"
"Um, no! He also got eaten by the bigger demon!" Mattias tries to backtrack, "I just forgot to say that part."
"Suuuuure." Kyle smirks, and Alfred, sensing an impending fight, turns to Mathew eagerly.
"Your turn Mattie!"
And immediately, Mathew forgets any scary story he's ever known. A creak at the door almost distracts them, but Alfred suddenly speaks up, even louder.
"Hurry up, Mattie! It's your turn last and then we gotta go to sleep! But! We can stay up until you're done! Right?"
Mathew gives Mattias a bemused look at Alfred's strange way of speaking, but Kyle suddenly pipes up in agreement.
"Yeah! It's the last one, and you didn't get a turn yet, so tell it quickly!"
Mathew flounders under the pressure.
"I.. I can't think of any scary stories now."
Alfred pressures him harder. "What about Monsters? You probably know a bunch scary stories about them, right? Or did you ever see one?"
Mathew feels cold again. Alfred doesn't know about the monster in Mathew's house. He just knows that Mathew believes in Monsters. Mathew tries to calm down. It's okay, just a scary story. Something occurs to Mathew, a way he can impress the other boys, if he doesn't say too much. He makes himself speak, feeling numb.
"Th-there's a monster in my house." He stumbles over his words, and flinches, waiting for the teasing. It doesn't come.
"For real?" Mattias sits up eagerly, making the air mattress tilt towards him. "What's it like?"
Mathew shudders at the memory.
"It... It comes out when it's dark." Or just whenever he sleeps, but Mathew doesn't share that part. Monsters are scarier in the dark. Or they're supposed to be. "When I'm sleeping, I can hear it on top of me. It...drools." It's not drool, exactly, but it's better than the truth, and anyways, it's just a scary story. "It... Touches me. I can feel it's...um...monster fingers."
Not just Mattias, but also Alfred and Kyle are leaning forwards, invested, and Mathew gains confidence. It's just a monster. Just a story. There's no monsters at Alfred's house.
"And it groans, kinda, and pants! Like this!" Mathew does an imitation of the sounds the monster makes as it touches him.
"What does it want?" Alfred breathes, wide-eyed.
Mathew wishes he knew. He tells them what he thinks.
"I think it wants to eat me. That's why it touches me, to see if I big enough yet. And when I am big enough-"
Mathew's voice breaks, remembering yesterday. The poking at his rear, like it was going to -
"That's Dogshit!" Kyle interrupts.
"Kyle!" Alfred gasps, scandalized, "That's a bad word!"
"Well it is!" Kyle argues. "Why wouldn't it just go find some other, bigger kid and eat it?"
Mathew feels wronged. He didn't share his darkest secret to get called a liar!
"It is so true!" He argues hotly, "It can't eat other kids because it lives in my house and I'm the only one there! That's why you can't come over!"
Alfred looks startled by this revelation.
Kyle looks unimpressed. "Yeah? Got proof?"
Mathew levels him with a sharp look.
"Uh, huh. I know it's there, and I know it's real because when I wake up every morning, there's monster goo all over me!"
"Monster goo?" Mattias puts in, uneasily.
"Mmmhmmm. It's kinda clearish white and sticky. And it's really, really, gross."
How can it be clear and white?" Kyle challenges, and Mathew flushes, now with frustration.
"I said clear-ish."
The argument devolves into the word for things that are almost-clear, like stained glass and slime, and it's all too easy for Mathew to let himself forget the monster, and get swept up into silly little arguments instead. He likes it better this way anyways.
They don't even notice that it's long past the lights-out time until Alfred's dad appears at 11 —a whole hour after it was supposed to be - and tells them its bedtime with a strangely shaky voice. He gives Mathew a strange twisted look, like he wants to say something but can't, before he turns off the light and closes the door.
Mathew remembers the creak outside the door before Alfred starting talking wierd, and wonders if Alfred's dad heard his story. He wonders if the look on Mr. Kirkland's face means that Alfred's house does have Monsters after all, and maybe Alfred just sleeps too deep to notice them. Mathew doesn't fall asleep easily that night.