Charlie woke up in the middle of the night. Something was pressing on his chest. On there sat a big, black night creature. Green, glowing eyes were peeping over the border of the duvet upon him. Charlie stared back at it and didn’t dare to actuate. He could barely breathe with the heavy weight he had upon his chest.

“Ha, Charlie, you’re mine,” the monster said. Of course the monster didn’t really speak, but Charlie could hear it in his head. It was exactly what monsters like this one would say.

“Help,” Charlie said softly, without moving his lips.

“That’s what you’d think,” the monster said. “No one’s here to help you. You’re all alone!”

At that moment, the door opened. There was a soft click to be heard and the room bathed in light.

“Charlie, are you still not sleeping?” Charlie’s dad entered the room and walked to the bed. “Do you still need to keep that old teddy bear with you in bed? You’re a too big boy for that.” He grabbed the old, raveled bear with the green bead eyes from Charlie’s chest.

“There was a monster.” Charlie was lying deep under the duvet. Only his eyes and his hair were peeking over it. That eyes stared intensely at the bear.

“Nonsense, Charlie. There is no monster. Now, go and sleep, you.” His dad threw the old bear in a corner of the room. He turned off the light and closed the door behind him. It was dark once again. Charlie closed his eyes tightly. There was no monster, that’s what his dad had said. But what did dads know about monsters? Dads were grown-ups. They were never afraid of the dark.

There was something in the room that was looking at him. Something, that wanted Charlie to open his eyes. Through slits, Charlie peered through the dark. And there was the monster again, in the corner where his dad had thrown it in. it was black and had a indistinct shape, with pointy ears. The green eyes lit up in the dark and looked at him.

“Here am I, Charlie. You thought I was gone, didn’t you? But you’re never gonna get rid of me, because I’m your monster!” Charlie quickly squeezed his eyes closed again and pulled the duvet over his head. He knew it was that damned bear! The raveled bear, that turned into a monster, at night, when the lights were off. Just like you have in the movies, where people change into werewolves. Werewolves. Something like that happened to the bear. He was like a werebear! But no one was going to believe that. Charlie heard it in the corner of the room, shuffling over the floor. He put his hands over his ears and started to count, “One, two, three…” When he reached five hundred, he fell asleep.

The sun was peeking through the window and in the room when Charlie woke up the next morning. Outside, the birds twittered happily. And against his chest, was the old, raveled teddy bear with the green bead eyes. Charlie was determined. He crammed the bear on the bottom of a large garbage  bag. He waited until the garbage man came and watched how the plastic bag disappeared into the truck. There, gone! Charlie thought relieved when the truck drove out of the street. Charlie was happy for the whole day. He had the feeling nothing could happen to him anymore. He told his dad that he’d thrown the bear away. His dad gave him a friendly pat on the shoulder.

“Good for you, son. That silliness is only for small kids.” Charlie was happy his dad was proud of him.

That night, he crawled into to bed cheerily. He thought of the bear and giggled. Boy, that bear would look really startled when it realized it was on the dump and not in Charlie’s room. Charlie could imagine perfectly how the werebear would be crawling out of under a pile of rotten macaroni, nasty stuff and wet mattresses. That monster would be really surprised!

Charlie listened to the sounds of cars that drove past in the dark. When it became silent, he fell into a peaceful sleep, until he woke up by a noise. He looked through his room. He heard the noise again. Was it coming from outside?

Charlie’s eyes flashed to the window. Behind the curtains was the vague shape of the moon to be seen. The noise was coming closer. Something scraped against the wall. Charlie heard soft heavily breathing and moaning. It was impossible, but it sounded like there was something working up against the outside wall with effort.

Charlie couldn’t keep his eyes off of the window. Suddenly, there appeared an indistinct shape with pointy ears from behind the curtains. A dark figure that breathed growlingly and shakingly.

“No! Go away!”, Charlie hollered. But the window was getting shoved open slowly and there was a soft thump.

“Here I am again, Charlie. I’m your monster. You’re not getting rid off me that fast!” The door opened and the light went on.

“Charlie, why are you making such incredible noises?”, his dad walked in the room, stopped in his tracks confused and stared at the floor. “What’s this, Charlie? You said you’d thrown it away?” Under the window was the old teddy bear, lying motionless with dull, staring eyes. Dad walked to it to pick it up. “It smells horrid! What in God’s name have you done with it? There’s even macaroni in its fur! And why did you lie to me?” with a disgusted face, dad held the bear inbetween two fingers by its ear up in the air.

“I didn’t lie, daddy. I did throw it away,” Charlie said. “But it came back.” Charlie’s eyes were wide open of fear. His dad looked at him in silence for a while.

“Right, Charlie. We’ll talk about it in the morning. I’ll take this rancid thing. Goodnight, sport.”

In the middle of the night, Charlie awoke again by a strange sound. He looked around sleepily. No monster to be seen. There was the sound again. This time, he recognized the voice of his dad. What was he shouting? Charlie crawled out of bed quickly, and walked over to the corridor.

“Go away!”, Charlie heard his father call. “Away!” Charlie opened the door to his dad’s bedroom carefully.

“What’s wrong, daddy?” He turned on the light. His dad was sat on his bed with pulled up knees under the duvet. His eyes blinked for the light and stared in abhorrence at the end of the bed. There was Charlie’s old teddy bear, motionless, with green bead eyes that shimmered dull in the light.

“It’s only the bear, daddy.” Charlie said softly. Dad shook his head.

“I-I don’t understand,” he stammered. I really thought there was a monster on the end of the bed. A black nightmonster with glowing eyes. And how did that bear get there? I threw it in the bin, before I went to bed.” They looked at each other for a short while. “Charlie, what do you say about a nice, little campfire?” dad said eventually.

They pulled their coats over their pajamas and dragged pieces of wood, branches and old papers into the garden. There, they made a pretty fire in a circle of stones. The flames went high up in the night sky, when Charlie threw the bear into the fire.

Charlie and his dad were sat next to each other in squat position and gazed into the fire. They inhaled the searing air of burnt bear fur. They sat there until the bear was turned into a pile of ash.

“That was that, dad.” Charlie whispered.

With their arms around each other, they walked inside. They threw their coats on the hat stand, crawled in dad’s bed and fell asleep, close to each other.

Outside in the garden, lay a still slightly burning pile of ash.

There were only two green bead eyes in there, that suddenly started glowing brightly and moved in the moonlight…