Close My Eyes

That night the man slept in my bed. Mother had made me bring him some of the stew she had made, the whole time I was up there I knew my father was nearby looking for any sign that then man was connected to the ones from earlier. I still didn't know why he was frightened by those men who had come. What was their connection to the man lying in my bed?
"Mother was is pa so upset?" I asked her as we washed all the dishes.
"Oh he's not he's just thinking about how much we'll need to stock up for the winter." I didn't have to see her face to know she was lying.
What weren't they telling me? She helped me lay out some bedding in the main room next to the fireplace. After pa made the boys go to bed, yelling for them to be quiet, he came down and patted my head.
"Everything will be fine in the morning." He promised kissing my head before heading to his room.
I laid awake for a long time thinking about the events that had happened that day. They were hiding something from me. They didn't know that I could tell that under the front they were putting up I could see the fear and the worry. I had dozed for awhile when I heard voices coming from the kitchen. Getting up quietly I made my way over to the doorway and sat down so they wouldn't see me.
"She's old enough to know now." That was Mother.
"No! I will not let them get her! We've hidden her for this long I will not let them find her now!" Pa sounded angrier then when he was talking to those men.
"She is not a child anymore! She is old enough to go into the wood and be expected to bring home dinner! She has a right to know!" My mother yelled right back startling me.
"We can't tell her, after all this time. How could we look right at her and tell her we're not her parents?" My pa asked his voice sounding desperate.
I didn't move. The news wasn't all that shocking to me. I had figured as much when I heard tales about how I was when I was five or so but not when I was a baby. Besides no one else in the family couldn't see. Only me. I started listening again barely catching what my mother had said.
"She needs to know how much danger she's in. Even if it means she hates us we have to tell her." Her voice was soothing, it washed over me along with the fear hidden in it.
"But how do you tell someone that everyone in the entire world wants her dead?" He sounded as if this last part killed him.
The entire world? This time I felt fear myself. All the way down to the core of strength that I had.
"How do you tell someone that her entire family was murdered? How?"
I stopped listening and made my way back over to my makeshift bed. I didn't want to hear anymore. This secret I didn't want to know, because it meant a few things. One: The people I knew to be my parents weren't. There was no way they could be. Two: People wanted me dead just because I existed. And finally Three: I was an Elvern. A monster.