Short Story: Birth of a Monster

It was a birth of a monster. I couldn’t forget those distant eyes and the red face. The death of expression. Back then, I saw a creature suffering, though I occasionally forgot it, wishing for a quick death. Not mine, but its. My heart rebuked me for my callous thoughts. How could anyone wish for death? I guess my heart still thought there was good in anyone and hope to be carried. But it was the same heart which cried under the monster’s gaze. 

Those were the early days when I was still confused about what I saw transforming in front of my eyes. Naively I thought it all passing, and the suffering would end, and the understanding could begin. But in those days, I have yet to face the nature of man. How petty, how bitter, and how no-fault was one’s could live inside a soul. A soul which had once been beautiful. Generous. Kind. Now it died under history and unspoken words, taking another form. A form which would torment me.

Here I have to tell you, while I’m not innocent, in any aspect, I’m a mortal and carry my sins around, I never called for this; I never caused this; I was merely an observer who let the monster to be born too obsessed with who I was. Oh, no one would blame me. Some might, but those well versed in psychology and destinies of the individual would consider self-sacrifice no path for a child.

Now you know it. I’m the child of the helpless creature. The one who has lost its life and mind and is willing to hurt others while wailing at its own miserable existence. That is the monster I speak of. The one which in its own destruction takes others with it, letting the ripples carry beyond the endurance of the flesh.

I could have stopped it, should have. The fault lies in me. I alone remember the transformation, the decay of a person into a monster, who shouts at the rooftops: “It is I who suffer, it is I who must be seen, heard, and mended. It is I who only exists.” Damned be the others. That’s my addition. Not the monster’s.

They say, the wise ones, that the sins of fathers and mothers are their own. But I’m not sure if they have ever seen that swollen red face, the watering empty eyes, and the shame and blame behind them, and felt love and hurt. What if and could have been play their tune forever until one of us is six feet under. 

So my question is, how you kill a monster when all hope is gone?

You might blame me for exaggerating or insist hope never dies. No monsters exist, only the victims of circumstances and predestinies. Tell me that when you are face-to-face with the monster, choosing spite over happiness over again, willingly dwelling in the misery and drag others down with it. And I feel that I’m gathering that same wail I hear it howl at nights inside me. Alone, unable to speak when faced with the sounds of platitudes of those who don’t understand the birth of a monster and what it is to be a child of one.

Now leave me in peace as I wish quick death for one of us. The ultimate corrector of all wrong, leaving behind unresolved cruelty.

Thank you for reading, and have a blissful day ❤

© K.A. Ashcomb