The thing beneath the bed had several hundred arms, and at the end of each arm was a small three-fingered claw that opened and closed as if hungry. The claws made an almost imperceptible clicking. You had to keep very still to hear them.
Jimmy lay on his back near the edge of the bed, his hands behind his head, staring at the ceiling. He couldn't see the several hundred claws at the ends of the several hundred arms, but he knew they were there. They lurked just out of sight, all around the bed, waiting for a hand or foot to be carelessly draped over any of the bed's four sides. Even though he knew about the thing beneath the bed, and knew what it could do, Jimmy felt no fear. He had an understanding with it. Besides, the little arms of the thing never reached up and over the bed itself. That would not be fair.
Tommy, Jimmy's little brother, whimpered quietly.
Jimmy sighed.
"What's wrong now?" he muttered.
"The... the thing under the bed... it scares me," Tommy whispered. The little boy had placed himself as near the exact center of the bed as he could, and kept looking at the four sides of the bed, one after another, as if he expected something horrible to rise up and snatch him.
"I told you, it won't get you unless you hang something over the edge," Jimmy said wearily.
"But..."
"I know, I know. It's there, and you know it's there, and it probably knows you're here, but there's nothing to be afraid of as long as you're quiet and still. It'll be there all night, it'll fade away in the morning, it'll be back tomorrow night, and there's nothing you can do about it. But as long as you don't hang something over the edge, it can't hurt you."
Tommy shivered.
"Oh, but if you do hang something over the edge," Jimmy continued grimly, "then there's hell to pay. Let's just say it's a foot. No, a hand. A hand is better. Let's say you go to sleep and have a dream and move around a little, and your hand goes over the edge of the bed..."
"Jimmy, don't..."
"... and immediately, five sets of claws latch onto your fingertips, and a couple more slam into your palm, and maybe a couple more grab your wrist. And they start chewing..."
Tommy began to cry. He tried his best to muffle the noise. It wouldn't do to alert the thing beneath the bed.
"While they chew, they pull, and soon they've got your whole arm over the edge. You're probably awake by now, but it doesn't matter. There's nothing you can do. It's dragging you down by your tendons, it's got a firm grip on your veins, it's gnawing on your bones..."
"Mu... Momm..."
"No, Mom can't help you. She'll never even know. The thing beneath the bed works quietly, and you're in too much pain to scream.
"Now, where was I? Oh, yes. Dragging you down. Well, of course, you're grabbing the covers and the sheets and the mattress, trying to hold on, trying to drag yourself back up. Maybe you're trying to grab hold of me, but I'd just be brushing you off. And I couldn't help you, anyway. The thing beneath the bed is incredibly strong. Once it gets you, you're going down.
"Now it's slamming its little claws into your neck, and it yanks your head over the side. One arm stuffs its claw up a nostril. Another reaches into an eye. Another eats into an ear. And they begin to shake your head, round and round, side to side, ripping your brains to shreds. Your legs are kicking wildly in the air, and the one arm you've got left is waving around, but that's just reflexes, 'cause you're already dead.
"But it's not over yet. The thing beneath the bed pulls you down to be with it, to become a part of it, to get digested slowly in the night. And when the morning comes, when the sun rises in the sky, the thing beneath the bed will fade away to whatever place it goes to hide from the daylight, and all that's left of you is a little dust ball that Mom will vacuum up in the morning..."
"MOMMY!!!" the little boy suddenly screamed.
"You little shit..." Jimmy snarled, raising up on his elbows to glare at his little brother.
A thin band of light appeared at the base of their bedroom door. Steps neared in the hall outside. The several hundred little arms with all their little claws withdrew to wait beneath the bed.
The door opened, revealing the silhouette of a young woman.
"What's going on in here?" she demanded.
"Nothing, Mom," Jimmy said.
"Tommy?"
"Nothin'." The little boy sniffed.
The silhouette stared at them in silence for a long moment.
"Jimmy, quit whatever you're doing to your brother. Do you understand me?"
"Aw, Mom..."
"Do you understand?"
"Yes'm."
The door slammed. Their mother's steps receded. The band of light disappeared. The several hundred little arms with all their hungry claws stretched up from beneath the bed like grotesque weeds growing fast.
The brothers lay in silence for a while.
"I hate you," Jimmy told Tommy.
"Why?"
"Because I hate you," Jimmy said simply. "Because you are here. Because before you were alive, this room was mine, and this bed was mine, and I didn't have to share it with a sniveling little bastard. Because before you were alive, it was just Mom and Dad and me, and then you came, and Dad died, and Mom got poor, and now we got nothing but this one room and one bed and I have to put up with you being in it with me..." Jimmy's voice broke; Tommy wasn't sure whether it was because of rage or grief. "You little shit."
Tommy thought about that for a while.
"I don't hate you," he said finally.
"Shut up."
"Why can't Mommy see it?" Tommy whispered, more to himself than to his brother. But Jimmy answered anyway.
"Grownups are different. They can't see things like that."
"It can't get Mommy," Tommy said.
"Sure it can, if it wanted to. Just 'cause she can't see it doesn't mean it can't get her."
"It can't get Mommy," Tommy insisted. He needed to believe that.
"Oh, shut up." Jimmy rolled away from his brother and lay on his side, near the edge of the bed.
"Why won't it just go away?" Tommy whispered plaintively.
"It has to eat. It won't leave until it eats. Once it eats, it'll go away."
"You're too near the edge, Jimmy..."
"It won't get me."
"Why not?"
"Because I made a deal with it."
Jimmy hesitated.
"What kind of deal?" he asked.
"I'm going to wait 'til you get older and fatter," Jimmy whispered in a cold, grim voice. "Then I'm going to feed you to it."
Tommy shivered and shrank away as if his brother had become a monster.
"Jimmy..."
"Shut up," the monster hissed. "Another word and I shove your face over the edge right now."
Tommy became very quiet. He listened to the sounds of the night. The breathing of his older brother. The rapid beat of his own heart. The imagined - maybe imagined - clicking of hundreds of tiny claws. Tommy waited.
And while he waited, he thought about the things his brother had said. They played in his mind like a looped recording.
You little shit...
It has to eat...
I made a deal with it...
feed you to it...
shut up...
you sniveling little bastard...
you little shit...
It has to eat...
Tommy didn't know how long he waited. Perhaps at some time during the night, fatigue got the better of fear, and he slept for a while. Eventually, Tommy became aware of his brother's deep, regular breathing.
Tommy looked at his brother. Jimmy's back was still turned to him. Tommy raised up slowly and looked down at Jimmy. He noticed that while his brother slept within inches of the edge of the bed, he had been careful to keep his arms close to his body.
Blood pounded in Tommy's ears as he gently pushed Jimmy's left arm until the hand hung limply over the edge of the bed. Then Tommy moved away and waited nervously.
Only a few seconds passed before Tommy heard his brother gasp. He kept his eyes rigidly on the ceiling as his brother began to thrash wildly beside him. From time to time, he had to brush off Jimmy's desperate grasping hand. He shuddered each time it touched him.
It did not take long. Jimmy's bare feet slipped over the edge and disappeared. But Tommy still stared rigidly at the ceiling tiles, trying to convince himself everything was going to be okay, trying to count the tiles on the ceiling, trying to ignore the crunching and sucking sounds beneath the bed that seemed to go on for an eternity.
A few minutes after eternity, the sun rose in the sky and shone through the bedroom window. Little Tommy, not previously known for his neatness, surprised his mother by starting his Saturday morning vacuuming his room.
He was particularly careful to get the large dust ball beneath the bed.