For the last two weeks Charlie has been saying “it’s Halloween tonight!”
She’s been wrong, of course, but I love her excitement. She loves pumpkins and fall decorations. Ever since our neighbors put out their decorations she’s been keen to have her own.
We finally made her dream come true by picking up about 5 pumpkins and a sparkly dog carrying a jack-o-lantern that lights up at night. She takes trips outside to pet the puppy and kiss the pumpkins because she’s sweet like that.
Watching her grow up has me thinking a lot lately about what the world looks like through a child’s perspective. Thus, with Halloween upon us I came up with the final Fall/Halloween themed piece. Though one of the leads in the story is a little girl, the story is told from the perspective of the parent. I like that it captures the feeling of how things sort of unfurl before our eyes and we feel like we’re along for the ride.
The Monsters of Ravenwood
Jill N Davies
“Tell me again how you found us?”
The vampire’s thick Romanian accent sounded like something straight from a campy horror movie, but I don’t doubt that he’s the real thing. After getting tackled by wearwolf, absorbed by a gelatinous cube, haunted by a gang of ghosts and drooled over by a bunch of zombies, Vlad the vampire was almost a welcome relief. At least he spoke English… mostly.
I wanted to ask myself how I ended up in this situation, but the truth is that I knew the answer. Tina never did have much of an imagination.
“It wasn’t hard to figure it out. I’ve been tracking movement from this sewer drain for months now,” Tina said.
“Ah yes, our secret entrance. You’re a clever little human, aren’t you?” Vlad raised a bushy eyebrow over dark, mesmerizing eyes. I’d get lost in his eyes if it weren’t for the fangs.
“Not a very good secret if you ask me. You guys use it like a revolving door, and he doesn’t even wait till after midnight!” Tina pointed an accusatory finger at the furry giant hanging out in the shadows of the archway.
Vlad followed her gesture. When his eyes lit upon the figure he cursed in another language.
“Sasquatch! We’ve talked about this. You’re too big to be using the front entrance!”
The bigfoot moaned something back at him. I know vampires are supposed to be immortal, but I don’t know that I’d have the guts to stand up to that guy.
“I don’t care if it’s the closest to the woods. You go the back way!” Vlad responded.
Sasquatch bellowed.
Vlad rubbed his temples in exasperation before refocusing his attention on my eleven-year-old daughter. “So, one yeti climbs out of the sewer and you figured out our entire underground city?”
“Well, that and city workers don’t normally have bolts sticking out of their necks—or randomly lose an arm or an ear,” Tina said.
Vlad shifted his gaze to Frankenstein and the zombies, who only lifted their shoulders as if to say eh, it was worth a shot.
“Oh, and fog doesn’t moan or spread out in every direction after it rises from the ground,” Tina added.
The ghosts rushed to hide behind Nessie and the Kraken. Vlad runs his hands down his face in exasperation. “Am I the only one around here that cares to keep our secret society secret?”
“Nah, Mr. Call of the Wild over here is very discrete,” Tina said.
The wearwolf’s massive jaw falls open.
“How’d you figure Buddy out?” Vlad asked.
Honestly, I was wondering the same thing. Buddy’s been our next-door neighbor for 8 years now…
“Okay, first of all his name is Buddy,” Tina started.
“People can be named Buddy,” Vlad protested.
“And second of all, he always gets really itchy and sniffy right before the moon is full,” she finished.
“We’re working on that—That’s not the point! Do you know what you’ve done, coming down here?” Vlad shouted.
It turned out that a shouting vampire is a lot less scary than I might’ve thought, but that could’ve been due to the type of shout. My sweet child had completely unsettled him. She wasn’t even scared. In fact, she looked downright proud.
“I’ve unearthed an entire monster community!” she said.
“That’s a problem,” Vlad said.
“Why?”
“Because people are scared of monsters! What do you think they’re going to do us now that you know we’re down here?” he shouted.
“I’m not scared,” she shrugged.
“Your dad is really freaked out right now.” Vlad gestured and all eyes were on me.
A shudder went down my spine when the giant spider blinked all 8 of her eyes at once. Tina looked like she’d forgotten I was there. I realized they were all waiting for me to say something.
“Hey… monsters…” I managed.
“See? This is what people do when they know about us,” Vlad said.
“He hasn’t done anything,” Tina argued.
“Not yet,” Vlad said. “First, it’s the freak-outs, then it’s pitchforks, torches, silver bullets and wooden stakes…”
Buddy shuddered at the mention of silver bullets.
“And nobody cares that we don’t hurt anybody anymore!” Vlad lamented.
“You… don’t… you don’t?” I asked, keen to learn more about this turn of events.
“No. We are a peaceful community. Kraken here is a pacifist.”
The giant sea monster nodded, and the nearby dock rocked in the wake.
Peaceful? It was a hard pill to swallow—suspicious at best. Weren’t vampires skilled in deception? All at once I realized what they were up to, and that I let Tina fall right into it…
I grabbed her shoulder and tugged. “Stop looking at him, Honey—he’s dangerous,” I said.
“Daaa-aad,” she moaned. I could see her eyes roll through the back of her skull.
“I’m not dangerous!” Vlad protested. “I haven’t had human blood since 1982!”
Tina looked impressed.
“That’s not very long ago,” I protested.
“Some advancements take time! They didn’t perfect the anti-wearwolf serum until 2003!” Vlad said.
“What serum? He’s a wearwolf!”
“Yeah, but did he eat you?” Vlad asked, throwing his arms up in the air. “I don’t know what you humans want from us! We monsters do our best. We’ve made advancements in medicine and technology just like you have. Most ghosts get their haunting done by trolling online. Vampires drink filtered plasma, zombies eat 3D-printed brain matter! All we want is to live in peace in a nice neighborhood!”
“We live right next to monsters. This is so cool!” Tina oozed.
“Okay, I get it. You’re not bad guys,” I said.
“Some of us are girls,” a witch, who was just descending the sewer escalator with a bag full of candy protested.
“You’re not bad folks,” I corrected.
Vlad and the sasquatch nodded.
“So, what happens now?” I asked.
Vlad shrugged. “We wait for the trick-or-treaters to finish up. Buddy will take you home.”
The End
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