The Glowing Lizard

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ตัวอย่างเล็กน้อย:

"Wow! That is COOL! A glowing lizard!" said Nick, after I had finished the most frightening story in the world.

Cool? He had just said it was cool?

"You're supposed to get scared, Nick. Like normal kids."

"I know you were expecting me to get really scared and terrified,right? Ha ha... Sorry old friend. Well, at least it's acceptable. Fine then, I will sleep and have a visit to a place much more interesting, REPTIQUES!!!!"

Can I take my words back? How on Earth could I ever... ever think this boy is cute?

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อยากได้ความเห็นว่าทุกคนคิดว่าเรื่องนี้เป็นยังไง

เนื้อเรื่อง

The Glowing Lizard

            I had a part time job when I was thirteen.

It was a very easy and handy job of taking good care of a six-year-old boy next door, Nick. He was quite a cute and rather intelligent kid in my opinion, and all I had to do, was put him to bed.

But it was not that easy. Nick would not sleep without a bedtime story. He said he needs to have someone beside his bed before heading to his imaginary world of ‘Reptiques’. Well, that’s what he called it.

‘It’s the paradise for reptiles.’ He told me once when I asked him about it. He really liked reptiles, as you can see. In whatever story I told him must include some sort of these disgusting creatures, or else he would protest by opening his eyes as wide as he could, telling me that he’s not sleeping for the rest of the night. And that was another tough thing in the job.

I hated reptiles.

That’s a fact even now that I’m already 19.

However, because the job was much easier than it did hard, I came to my little weird neighbor’s house every night.

“Hey! How’s it going, Nicky?” I asked as usual when I saw him ready in his bed when I arrived. “Are you prepared for my new story today?”

“Yes!!!” He answered excitedly. “Is it a real story?”

“Of course it is!” from my imagination. I wouldn’t say the last part ‘cause Nick really wanted me to tell him a real story. He thought it is more exciting, I guessed. But, you know, real stories were too boring for a boy like him after all.

“And you gonna like this one I’m telling you! It’s about a super loyal lizard living with his master in the woods…”

“What’s the story’s name?” Nick broke out with a question as I was about to begin.

A name?

“Ahh… It’s called…The Invisible Partner.” I had just made it up. “Now can we continue?”

“Of course” Nick answered after he had repeated the story’s name several times mentally as though he was going to remember it until the end of his life.

I would need to have a note that next time… my story must have a proper name.

“This lizard was actually not only the man’s friend or partner, but he was the man’s soul. One couldn’t live without the other. They ate, drank, and hunted together. But one day, their perfect happy lives came to its end. The man died from a disease that a lizard would never get.

“The lizard was very sad. Deep in his grief, he kept on asking God why couldn’t he, as well, get the disease so that they would die together. He cried and cried and cried, non-stop until he really did die- die with a bleeding heart.

“Finally, their wishes of being together once again came true. And this time, nothing would ever tear them apart. And ever since, many villagers found these two loyal friends in the woods around the area they once accommodated. But there was something more than that. Do you know what is it, Nicky?”

I asked him with a very light and scary voice. As scary as I thought I could.

“No” Nick answered with the same tone of voice.

“Every time these people saw the man, they wouldn’t see nor hear the lizard. But they knew he was there, just on the man’s shoulder. They knew it because the man talked and sometimes fondled it with his hands. Yes… The lizard was invisible. But why? No one knows.

“However, there was still one special day that people would able to hear and see the lizard. It has to be a full moon night. When the woods are full of moonlight, if you’re lucky, you would see the lizard, again, on the man’s shoulder, glowing among the yellowish beam of the moon. Its voice echoed in the empty wild…”

“Wow! That is COOL! A glowing lizard!” said Nick, after I had finished the most frightening story in the world.

Cool? He’d just said it was cool?

“You’re supposed to get scared, Nick. Like normal kids.”

“I know you were expecting me to get really scared and terrified, right? Ha ha… Sorry old friend. Well, at least it’s acceptable. Fine then, I will sleep and have a visit to a place much more interesting, the REPTIQUES!!!!!”

Can I take my words back? How on Earth could I ever…ever think this boy was cute?

“Sandy, did you hear that?”

Nick called my name with a childish serious voice when I was about to scream impatiently at his face. I could hear his voice a little bit shaking.

“What?”

I asked, trying to listen to whatever he was referring to. But I did not notice anything unusual at all. Just the winds blowing outside the only window in the room above his bed, that’s all.

Or was it possible that perhaps he was just fooling around, trying to scare me?

No. He was too young and looked too serious to do so.

“I hear something from behind that curtain.” He said, pointing his tiny forefinger to the window.

“What kind of sound?”

“I don’t know. But it sounds familiar… Just like the sound Dub makes when he’s hungry.”

Dub was Nick’s best friend- a lizard friend, though. Nick normally kept him in a box inside his table’s drawer before I arrived. He knew it quite well how badly I would react when I saw any kind of reptiles. So Dub should have stood by at his place by now.

I moved closer to the window and listened more carefully.

“I don’t hear anything, Nick.”

“Are you deaf? The sound seems very loud right now.”

“No, I’m not a deaf otherwise I won’t hear what you’re saying as well.”

I could see that Nick’s face was getting paler and paler. Scandalously, I had to confess that right now I was starting to get scared of my own story - an invisible and unhearable lizard. Embarrassing wasn’t it?

“It’s time to sleep, Nicky. All you’ve got to do from now on is lie down and go to your world of Reptiques. Your friends must be waiting for you now since it is very late.” I pulled his blanket up to his neck. “Have a nice dream, okay? Don’t worry of those sounds you hear. It’s just the sound of the nature.”

I wanted to go home, Nick. I also had some friends waiting for me on facebook.  

“How do you know what kind of sound is it since you couldn’t hear it at all?”

What a bright little kid.

“Because I’ve seen a lot more things than you do in my life and I could guess what you’re hearing from outside the window. It could be any kind of creatures.”

“You’re just seven years older than me, remember?”

“Whatever, Nick. Sleep!”

“Alright, alright. I’ll sleep. Good night.”

“Good night.”

****************

            I woke up freshly the next day. Forgetting almost everything happened last night. It was Saturday and I had some homework to do. I was working on a report about Childhood VS. Adolescence -same old topic.

            I switched on the computer, and started working as soon as I had my breakfast. My parents had all gone to the laboratory to work when I was still in bed, so did my elder sister who hardly stays at home. And because I was all by myself, I could use this only computer in the house without queuing or fighting with anyone.

            Not knowing where to start, I decided to simply google ‘Childhood VS. Adolescence’. And press Enter.

            As I had expected, piles of links popped up. Wikipedia, Childhood and Adolescent Development, Stages of human life, The Lost of Childhood Hidden Hearing Sense…

          The Lost of Childhood Hidden Hearing Sense?

            This topic reminded me of what happened with Nick yesterday.

            Even though I knew it didn’t have anything to do with my report, I clicked on this attracting heading. Perhaps it would help me to understand that boy a little more.

            I waited for a moment while my crappy computer was fighting with its turtle-like speed. And when the first but last paragraph appeared on the monitor, my eyes widen and my hands were getting wetter and wetter. And as I reread the paragraph once again, I felt as if the blood in my body was freezing.

            ‘There’s a proven scientific research states that children with 2-7 years of age are able to hear something grown-ups don’t (especially the sound of non-human beings). But what’s definitely the same in all of them is that they will slightly loss their ability as they grow. And as soon as they reach the stage of adolescence, this unusual sense of hearing will be completely disappeared. The ability cannot be seen…..’

            NON-HUMAN BEINGS?

            This article was telling me that what Nick heard yesterday was some kind of ghosts or something? Well, although my parents are scientists, I believe in ghosts. I believe that ghosts do exist, but they just don’t appear to be seen.

            But if this article was really reliable, it meant that ghosts don’t appear to be seen but do appear to be heard! Or perhaps they do appear to be seen, but the curtain was just covering it which meant if I was brave enough to open the curtain yesterday, I might had seen what ghosts looked like by now.

            This was unbelievable!

            I really didn’t know what to do. Should I try to prove my own presumption this evening, or just ignore whatever creature out that boy’s room and do my job right away? Either choice seemed very soul-stirring that a person like me was too craven to choose.

            I wasn’t sure if I would able to prove that thing’s existence, but if I didn’t offer a try, I’m pretty sure I would have to quit my job out of the fretful feelings. Even though quitting the job wouldn’t affect my life that much, I felt kind of guilty in leaving Nick, that little boy all by himself with that grumpy ghost. At least I’m seven years older than him, am I not?  

            All right, then. After some consideration, I had decided that I would just open that trouble-causing curtain and see how this story will continue!

****************

            It’s time.

            I was standing in front of my neighbor’s house again, at the same time. I couldn’t even give just a glance at Nick’s window up there. Feeling like a coward, I walked in.

            “Hey, Nicky!”

            I called him as usual. But what unusual was my mood. It was not like when you normally walk into a six-year-old boy’s room, planning to tell him a bedtime story. It was like I was walking into a battle that I would never win.

            ‘Too late to give up,’ I told myself. ‘Just fight and win’

          “Hey! Sandy.”

            Nick cried back without letting his eyes off the game station his parents bought him a couple of days ago.

            “I thought you are supposed to be in your bed when I come, Nick”, I said.

            “I am supposed to, yes, but I don’t want to.”

            Nick started to bother me again. He was normally seemed to be a good boy, but when he wasn’t, you better hold on your temper because you could get angry to death at anytime.

            But this time, his irritating behavior was helping me to get more relax and released that perhaps that ghost might have already gone.

            “That annoying sound keeps on roaring behind the curtain that I can’t even have a moment of sleep last night. So I wouldn’t bother trying to sleep again tonight ‘cause it has been proved worthless.”

            Oh my.

            This boy was always over expected. Always.

            “You mean… You still hear the gh.. Ah.. the strange sounds you heard yesterday?” Luckily I hadn’t burst that word out. The ghost, I meant.

            “Yeah, that’s right. I’ve tried to scare whatever out there away. But it didn’t work.”

            “Have you seen Dub today?”

            “Yes, of course. He’s the only friend I have right now. And he always will be.”

            “Okay, okay…. Have you tried to open the curtain?”

            “Do you think I can?” Nick answered moodily.

            And he’s right. The curtain was too high for him to reach it himself. That’s why he can’t even open room’s window. He had always needed help.

            I sighed.

            Time was up. I couldn’t find any other option other than my original choice -open and see what’s out there.

            Come on, Sandy. You can do it!

            I could feel my heart beating very fast as I walked toward the window. I stared for a moment or two at the curtain. There’s one thing I knew for sure: whatever I’m facing from now on would perhaps be the most terrifying creature I would ever face in my whole life. So a deep breath I took.

            I closed my eyes, held my breath, and then….

            The curtain is opened.

            And the only thing left I’ve got to do, was just open my eyes. Open! My! Eyes! I ordered myself.

            But I couldn’t. I just simply couldn’t do it.

            “A lizard!”

            I startled. “Sandy, there’s a lizard out there! A huge one!”

            What?

            I quickly opened my eyes. And what lied in my sight was a lizard with red spots on its body about my hand’s size. Nick was right; it was a super huge one. A lizard that had made me almost lost my mind out of fear!

            I couldn’t believe this.

            I turned dizzily to Nick who was staring at that red-spotted lizard with his sparkling eyes excitedly...

****************

            I rushed out of the house, swearing to myself that I would quit this job as quickly as possible before I would really gone mad because of those disgusting lizards. I knew for a long time that Nick liked lizards, but I didn’t know he loves it. There was no more than I single word to describe this insane boy!

            This was all his parents’ fault. Nick wouldn’t have such strange friends like this only if they came home every night and spend some time with him. I understood that they both had heavy workloads to cope with, but this was over the limit already. Nick would definitely go crazy one day.

            As I headed back to my house, from Nick’s house’s yard, I heard somebody walking down the street - two of them, walking slowly and staggeringly. One of them seemed to be crying. Who were these people?

Before I could continue on my way back home, their faces became more and more clear that I could figure out who those guys were.

            They were some of my neighbors that I haven’t ever expected to see them at this not yet late time – Nick’s parents.

            “Sandy?”

            “Yes, it’s me, Mr. Peterson.”

            Before Nick’s father could say anything else, his wife shouted at me angrily, “What were you doing in my house? Trying to steal something?”

            “I’m sorry Mrs. Peterson, but have you done too much work that you have forgotten who have you hired to baby-sit your child?” Even if I didn’t know why Mrs. Peterson burst that out, I shouted back angrily too, losing my temper completely as I wasn’t in the right mood from the beginning.

            “Of course I can. But I’ve just realized I hired the wrong person. I let a thief into my house and take care of my son!”

            “I don’t know what you’re talking about Mrs. Peterson, but if you don’t stop, sure I can sue you. And no need to worry, Mrs. Peterson, because I’m quitting this stupid job as well!”

            “Oh yeah, I’m afraid you wouldn’t have to quit. You don’t have any job to quit”, almost screamed, Mrs. Peterson subsided onto the floor and cried loudly. Mr. Peterson, who was trying to console his wife, also had his eyes red and full of tears. 

            What was happening to this couple?

            “Excuse me,” I asked after some moments of calming myself down “Is there anything bad happened? Why are you guys seemed so sad?”

            As soon as I finished my question, Mrs. Peterson looked up and shouted at me madly.

            “Nick is dead! He got crashed by a car two days ago and what do you expect us to feel, huh?!”

            “What?”

            “Sandy, I don’t know why you’re trying to tell us that you don’t know anything about this since you must have known it for some time. You have to see Nick every night. So if you really don’t know anything, it means you haven’t done your job as you’ve promised.” Mr. Peterson said to me.

            “Hold on a second. Are you mad? Nick was up there with me a few minutes ago! I’ve just put him to bed and you’re telling me now that he’s dead!”

            I pointed to Nick’s room – or actually his window where his room was – and I gradually looked up to the room for the first time of the day, forgetting how much I was madly afraid of that haunted window an hour ago.

            “…”

            There I saw the most frightening picture I’ve ever seen in my whole life – the worst moment ever - it was Nick with that red-spotted lizard on his shoulder which didn’t seem possible at all since Nick’s hands couldn’t even reach the window.

            The worst thing of all was that he was staring at me through the window – sadly, but coldly. He fondled the slightly glowing lizard that I realized later on was actually Dub, his only best friend and then they both gradually vanished from my sight, but have never vanished from my mind.

            I could always remember them – Nick and his true glowing lizard friend...

 

THE END