The green turtle nightlight appeared to be crawling up the wall. Betsy watched it, waiting for it to move one of its flippers, to inch its glowing body away from the power socket where it was fastened by steel and electricity.
She looked across the room at Margret, who was asleep, breathing easily. She fought the urge to slink out of bed, run to her parent’s room, crawl between them, safe and warm. But they weren’t home yet. They were out, and she could never sleep when they were out at bedtime.
She sighed. Her eyes left the turtle, trailed along the wall to the open closet and the black chasm within. She swore she heard noises from deep within that dark abyss, scratches and grunting. Something coming.
She shuddered, flopped over, tried to close her eyes and escape the world through sleep.
The bedroom door opened, light spilled across her face. She looked up, saw her mother silhouetted against the pale yellow glow of the hallway.
“Mom,” she said, and held out her hands toward the shadow. “Come here, I need a hug.”
Her mother moved to the bed, sat down next to her, and embraced her. Betsy breathed in her mother’s warmth, caressed her hand against the fabric of her scratchy black dress.
“How...” she started, but her mother shushed her, released her from her hug. She started again, whispering now. “How was the party?”
“It was fine,” her mother said, her face a dark void. The yellow light glowing behind her made her look like the angels Betsy had seen in the posters at Sunday school. She said so, and her mother chuckled, kissed her forehead.
“It’s time for you to go to sleep now,” she said, caressing Betsy’s hair.
Robert came to stand in the doorway. His body was a bright white light, illuminating the entire room.
“Time to sleep now,” he said, too loudly.
Across the room, Margret woke, sat up. She looked at her dad groggily, rubbed her eyes.
Betsy blinked, then pushed away her mother’s hand.
“What happens to us when we die?” she asked, looking skyward.
“Worms,” her mother said. “The worms crawl in, the worms crawl out,” she said, sing-song. Like a nursery rhyme, something from an old book of fables long gone to dust, only remembered by ancient gods and men of magic.
Her mother brought her hand to Betsy’s face once more, but it was not a hand. Never was. It was slick and black and tapered to a pointed end. It pressed into her forehead, then slid across her face, leaving a searing mark, and pushed into her mouth, gagging her.
“I love you,” her mother said.
Margret yelled, “Stop!” and jumped up from her bed. She ran toward the bright light of her father, but her mother was too fast. Another limb shot out, ripping the fabric of her party dress. It shot impossibly across the room and speared the girl in the stomach, nailed her to the ground.
The girls wiggled and belched what was inside them. Their mother stood and waited while their souls tore apart in slow increments, it was always slower in the young, and separated.
“There are a million ways to suffer,” their mother said.
The room was suddenly too small and so it expanded, and Mother with it, swallowing the light. Robert blistered and became a star. The thing’s onyx trunk of a throat worked hard to take it all in, to swallow it all, until it shone most brightly in the expanse, until it became the sky. A creator.