When I was a Child

As a child the other kids told me
A monster hides under our beds,
They live there, waiting for us,
They want to jump out and eat us.

That used to scare me,
But as I've grown out of my childhood,
I've known nothing's there,
Just silly stories to spook each other.

But to be honest, I've always been curious,
I've never once looked beneath my bed
To see if a monster or a demon
Is hiding there, waiting.

So now that the darkness has swallowed the sun,
I turn on my light, approach my bed, and peek underneath.

Nothing.
I figured.

But when I get up and turn off my light,
I hear a very tiny noise, the faintest of all sounds,
Almost like a breath or a huff,
So I approach my bed again, and peek.

I squint through the darkness,
And to my absolute horror and astonishment,
I see something, a set of eyes in fact,
But they aren't red or evil like I envisioned,
Instead they are white with blue irises and wide pupils.

They are human-like,
They are just like mine in fact.

I stare deeper at it and I make out a face,
A pale face, it now stands out in the dark, glowing even,
It has long, very dark hair,
Its body is thin and pale as well,

And then it hits me and practically knocks the wind out of me,
This thing looks identical to me, in every way.
How... how is that possible?
I must be dreaming,
Right?

As I start to tremble and sweat,
It grabs my arm suddenly,
I scream from the surprising action,
And as if I wasn't terrified enough, it spoke to me saying,
"You were always told a monster lives under your bed,
But that's a lie... the monster lives inside you.
It grows inside you until it takes over and you become it.
I'm the remains of the human you once were made of,
That's what truly lives under your bed,
Everyone has their remaining human-self living there,
But most don't realize it
Because their monster self put it there in the first place."

Panicking, I rip my arm away from its grip
And I run away, shutting myself in my bathroom,
But as I try to catch my breath, I instead catch a glimpse of my reflection,
And I scream in horror by what I see...
It isn't me as I know of, it's something truly hideous and horrific...

I look monstrous...
"What... what is this...? Am.. am I...?
I... m-m-me... no, this-this thing... I'm a.. a... monster...?"