The monster is the first thing I see when I wake up in the morning. The sunlight that filters through my bedroom window illuminates its unruly golden hair and dark brown eyes that I’d first mistaken for black. It stares me in the face, but I don’t say hi, or even good morning. Instead, I slide out of bed heading to the bathroom to brush my teeth. The monster follows me and watches as I squirt out pink bubblegum paste onto my sing along toothbrush that mommy got for me. I don’t sing along, and neither does my monster.
    I walk into the kitchen to see Mom and Richard cooking at the stove. Her shiny blonde hair is messy, but she doesn’t care as she and Richard listen to the morning tunes on the radio. They dance to the rhythms up’s and downs but stop when I stroll into the room.
    “Hi pumpkin,” Mommy gives me a smile that could shine a light on even the gloomiest of days.
    “Morning,” I answered blankly. The monster’s gaze is irate.
    “Hey kid,” Richard calls, and my monster growls.
    I sit at the table chewing my breakfast swiftly. If I don’t hurry, the monster will steal it from me.
    “Honey, can we talk when you get home from school? Richard and I have something we want to speak to you about,” Mom says softly while stroking my hair. The monster bats her hand away and she jerks.
    “Ok Mommy,” I say and head out the door to school.
    My monster follows me to class and sits on top of my desk until the first bell rings. It lets me be free from its company during school hours, but out of the corner of my eye, I still see it watching me from a distance.
It reappears by my side as I walk home from school. It like’s to play with my shadow, in fact, they’re best friends. My monster hides within my shadow and my shadow lets it.
    I get home to see Mommy and Richard sitting on the couch whispering to each other. Mom’s giggling, and Richard is unabashedly smiling. I keep my footsteps soft as I slip by, but as soon as I reach my room the monster slams the door and I wince. My mother comes up seconds later and asks me what’s wrong. I’ve tried to tell her about the monster before, but she doesn’t understand.
    “Sorry it was an accident,” I say quietly taking the blame for my monster.
    A couple of hours later I head down for dinner surprised to see Mom and Richard already seated without me. I sit down and eat my vegetables first, so my mom doesn’t yell at me.
    “Pumpkin there’s something I want to ask you about,” my mom starts hesitantly. I glance over and see Richard nervously flipping his red and white tie about; I hated that tie.
    “Richard and I are thinking of getting married, what would you say to that pumpkin?”
    My fork clattered to the ground. I looked over at my monster who had whacked it out of my hand.
    “That sounds good,” I answered going back to my peas, with my spoon instead this time. But my monster next to me is livid with the little attention I’ve paid to it. It shrieks and throws my whole plate to the floor. “Sorry,” I apologize as my mother bents to pick it up. “I can do that,” I grabbed it from her. It wasn’t fair she had to suffer for my monster’s antics.
    “Why don’t we talk about this later,” my mommy gives me a pained smile, and I nod washing the dish in the sink.
    As I laid in bed that night, my monster snuggles in close to me. I’ve always wondered before why it snuggled so close just to jump out and stare at me in the morning.  I’d given up trying to question it. I fell asleep with its hot breath against my shoulder, and it’s dark eyes staring me in the face.
    The next morning I am shocked to see my monster gone. I check under the bed because sometimes it likes to hide there, but it is empty, save for a few dust bunnies and lint. I wait for a while to see if it will come out from wherever it has hidden, but it doesn’t show itself, so I get out of bed and go brush my teeth. I had just reached the bathroom mirror when I met its eyes, making me jump. My monster stares back at me from within the mirror’s shiny surface, and I sigh ignoring it and heading to the sink. My monster draws nearer as well which makes me pause, and so my monster pauses with me. I picked up my toothbrush, and my monster picked it up as well.
Oh right, I remembered now I thought as I squeezed out my paste.
I am my monster.