Not Quite a Monster

One evening, there's a knock on the door of my house.

I open it into the rainy dusk, and there's a monster standing on my doorstep. Not some metaphor, a literal monster spattered in blood, unsettlingly-human eyes glinting from a red-smeared face. The sturdy fangs in his near-animal jaws offer no reassurance. I don't consider myself a skittish man, but my heart still rockets into my throat.

"I did what you said," he says to me in a small voice - at least, as small as someone's voice can be when they're seven-and-a-half-feet tall. "I finally looked at how big I was compared to them, and I realized that I was way bigger."

During my visits to the federal containment site, I'd told him to see what he was capable of. "You're much stronger than them. Why do you even stay?" I asked at one point, sitting across from him with a handful of Uno cards. Ostensibly, I was there for interview purposes, but I'd forgotten that several visits ago.

He shrugged. "I don't like hurting people," he said simply. "I want to be nice."

"But they're not nice to you here," I said, gesturing around at his barren containment room. "If you decided to be mean, you could get out, no problem. In my opinion, it would serve them right."

"Yes, but I don't like being mean." He delicately put down a card, careful not to spear the cardboard with his sharp claws. "Uno."

Now, here he is, standing on my doorstep, and he'd evidently decided to be mean.

I adjust my glasses. "...How do you know where I live?" is all I can think to ask, and he gives me a sheepish facsimile of a grin.

"I might be able to talk like a person, but I can still scent-track like a monster."

I tuck away all of the questions that arise from that information and instead simply pull him inside, shutting and locking the front door. "Wait right here," I direct, and then hurry to my laundry closet to get an armload of towels - dark-colored ones, so that the bloodstains don't show up. I try to scrub as much blood as I can out of his thick, fluffy coat of chocolate-brown fur, but it's stubborn. I lead him to the bathroom and get him to sit down in the shower - the only way he can fit inside without bumping into the showerhead - so that I can help him reach what few sections of himself he can't get to with his long arms. The water pouring down the drain is red, with flecks of brown mud from his trek through the downpour outside, and when we're both satisfied that he's finally clean I turn on the gas fireplace for him to dry out in front of.

"...Is there going to be a news report about what you did?" I ask him carefully as I sit down next to him, offering him a hot mug of tea. It looks almost comically small in his large hands when he accepts it, his clawed fingers wrapped around the cup.

He shakes his head. "Not about what I did," he says. "They won't think it's me at all. Everybody else is still in the facility, but they got out of their rooms, and..." He sighs. "Well, you saw how angry Millicent was at the scientists most of the time. It won't surprise me if it comes out that she ends up doing the most damage."

"...I'm just glad you're okay," I say quietly, holding out a hand. He hesitates for a moment, then his soft hand surrounds mine, and looking at it reminds me of when we held hands in his containment room after talking for a long time about the meaning of being human, and whether or not monsters like him can feel love.

"I don't think you're a monster," I had said firmly, my hand making a valiant attempt to stay locked around his much-larger one. "I mean, you might be a monster by some definition or another, but you're not a monster-monster. You know?"

"...I think I do," he said. "I just..." He paused. When I looked over, his large amber eyes were brimming with tears, shimmering in a way they never had before. "I just wish that people didn't see a monster when they look at me."

I spent a second longer staring at him, then scooted over until I was leaning comfortingly into his side. "If it helps, I don't see a monster when I look at you. I see a friend." I grinned. "And a handsome bastard."

He covered his face with one hand, and I could tell he was trying not to smile, despite the difficulty of such an expression on a face with a muzzle. "Shut up, I'm not handsome. Not like humans think of."

"That's because most humans are cowards!"

"Don't be rude!"

We continued bickering playfully until he scooped me up like I weighed nothing, and I came very close to knowing what it feels like to kiss a monster before the intercom buzzed to life and killed our good mood by cutting visiting hours short. I didn't know if it was homophobia or...monster-phobia that motivated the higher-ups, but either way my heart was racing, and I was bitter to have that moment stolen from me.

Now, though, I'm sitting right next to him, hand-in-hand, and there is no intercom, no visiting hours, and no scientists to tell us what to do. I don't say anything, though, and I don't ask him any more questions about what happened.

"Thank you," he says suddenly.

I look over. "Hm?"

"Thank you for telling me to take a better look at myself," he says, staring into the fire. "If you hadn't done that, I might not have even realized that I could take advantage of being a monster like I am."

"...I'll say it again, you're not a monster. Not really," I say. "You're a sweet guy who regularly kicks my ass at Uno." I lean against his shoulder. "Just a big ol' puppy dog."

He suddenly perks up. "Hey, can we play Uno? We might actually be able to play more than one game now that we don't have a time limit!"

"...As long as you promise not to hoard all of the wild draw-4s until the last round."

But he doesn't promise. And, of course, he kicks my ass. I don't even know if there's a strategy to actually apply in Uno, but he's practically throwing his cards across the room with how fast he gets rid of them. Despite the fact that I'm bad at Uno, it's nice to see him smiling, in his un-human way, his large amber eyes sparkling.

Sitting across from me, laughing when I try to tackle him and check what color his last card is, there's only so much I can do to keep myself from falling in love with him even more. It doesn't help when he wraps his arms around me, cloaking me in his thick, soft fur.

Safe. Warm.