I Can Still Hear It

"Don't move until Daddy gets home," my mother whispered, her voice cracking with anxiety. My little brother gripped my arm as we sat on the worn sofa, staring at the faint outline of her silhouette shuffling about. We heard her opening cupboards and swearing under her breath. "No candles," she accused as she bumped and banged and stubbed her toe. The idea of 'no candles' seemed very sinister to a seven-year-old, and I felt inexplicably guilty of the lack.

My brother's body rocked slightly against me as he wiggled his legs with unspent energy, though he remained uncharacteristically quiet. Another flash of lightning would paralyze his jitters, and his tiny hands would squeeze my flesh tighter. Sometimes I could feel his cheek pressed against my tricep, an unusual sensation, as we had never been very affectionate. But, our benign living room, in the only home we had ever known, became foreign and dangerous with this new word Momma had confided, "Blackout."

"It's just thunder," my mother tried, sounding unconvinced.

Eventually, Daddy did arrive, bringing with him the warm aura of safety and security his Papa Bear build reassured. The printing presses went down with the power outage; he arrived early from work bearing gifts: a prayer candle for Momma, a toy monkey for us, and enough blackout jokes to dispel the entities hiding in the shadows. My brother let go of my arm, and Momma stopped pacing.

He pulled the monkey from its box and explained, "We received it free from one of our suppliers." The monkey wore green overalls and sat at a mini drum kit. When powered with batteries, he would rock his smiling head from side to side and play the tiny drums, his foot hitting the base pedal every other beat. "He takes C batteries, and I didn't have any at the shop. I'll get you some as soon as possible."

"He seems rather delicate," Momma interjected, pulling the monkey away from Daddy's hands and out of our reach, "Let's wait for the batteries before we handle him too much." Walking away, she placed the candle on a nearby windowsill and the monkey right next to it, "I'll set him here, so you can still see him."

Daddy suggested we have a candlelit picnic in the living room. We nibbled on crackers and cheese, apples, and cold hot dogs as we waited for the storm to pass. But as the dark night wore on, the rain only increased in intensity, until even Daddy lost his good humor. We sat in the dark living room, lined up across the sofa, staring at the light from one candle and the smiling face of the monkey.

And then he started to play...

Tap, thump, tap, thump, the tinny sound of his drum-set sliced through the already thick silence. His eyes seemed to bore into us, tap, thump, tap, thump. Smiling, with wide, glassy eyes, he had an avid audience, as we could see little else in the dark. No one said a word for a long minute.

"Turn him off," Momma murmured to Daddy, trying to sound nonchalant and failing.

"Well, look at that," Daddy's warm voice rumbled, "I guess he already had batteries." The whole sofa shifted as his giant frame lifted and walked toward the window.

"Turn it off," Momma hissed, as though he hadn't heard her the first time, tap, thump, tap, thump.

As Daddy picked him up, I couldn't help but think that he looked straight at me as he continued to play. As Daddy moved him from side to side and upside down, looking for a button or a switch, his lifeless eyes said, "I see you." My brother held my arm again.

Daddy found a sliding on/off switch and toggled it back and forth. "Must be a short," he called out, louder than necessary, "He won't turn off."

"Take out the batteries," my mother ordered, sitting at the edge of her seat and gesticulating, as though Daddy needed more detailed instructions. Daddy fiddled, but he couldn't open the battery compartment, regardless of how many times Momma pointed and urged.

"It's screwed in," he admitted with defeat, "There's no way I'm going to find a tiny screwdriver right now in the dark."

"Well, you can't just leave it like that," Momma recriminated.

Tap, thump, tap, thump, tap, thump... the monkey continued to play.

"Do you really want me to try and go to the garage right now?" my dad asked, sounding tired and incredulous.

"You can take the candle," Momma ordered.

So we sat together, closer than necessary, in the pitch black of the storm, listening to the monkey play. I felt every heartbeat, every breath, and every drop of rain as we waited for the candle to return. Tap, thump, tap, thump...I wondered if Daddy might not ever return; he had taken all light and hope with him.

Lightning flashed, and the monkey mocked me with his smile. Tap, thump, tap, thump...

When Daddy returned, it was not with a victorious screwdriver held aloft. "I couldn't see anything out there," he apologized, "It's getting late anyhow. We should probably just go to bed."

"What about that thing?" Momma squeaked, gesturing with her head, as though she didn't want the monkey to know she was talking about it.

Always a problem solver, Daddy picked up the monkey and walked to the hallway closet. He set the still playing monkey on a shelf and closed the door. In the quiet of the dark, you could just barely hear the echo of his drums behind the door.

"I can still hear it," Momma complained.

Daddy opened the closet. I could see the monkey staring at me from under his arm. I regretted looking and held my breath as I turned away. Daddy placed a winter coat over the top of him. The coat's weight stopped his arms from making their full motion so that he now sounded like the ticking of a clock.

As we shuffled off to bed, I didn't miss seeing Momma lock the closet door as she passed.

The next morning, with the sun warming everything it touched, I had all but forgotten the monkey until I heard Daddy say, "It must have finally run out of juice." As we could no longer hear anything through the closet door.

But Momma insisted, "Take the batteries out of that thing. I don't want a repeat of last night."

Obligingly, Daddy found a tiny screwdriver and brought the monkey out of the closet. My brother and I watched from a safe distance as he unscrewed the battery compartment. It was my Dad's face, more than anything, that scared me; Daddy saw that it was empty- no batteries. He shook his head as though to clear his vision and then dropped the monkey on the kitchen table with a gasp. The impact set the monkey to tap, thump, tap, slowly, before it fell silent on its side.

Daddy picked up the monkey, placed it back into its box, and shoved it into the furthest recesses of the closet. I heard the clack of the tumbler as he locked the door with finality.

The monkey stayed in that closet for the rest of my childhood. Woe was the day when you actually needed something from inside that door because you could almost feel the monkey staring at you through the box. I usually sang or spoke to myself, as though the sound would protect me from him. But my brother and I swear that on certain quiet days, when you walked by the door alone, you could still hear tap, thump, tap, thump, and you knew that he was always watching and waiting.