Sincerely, Jennifer x

I do my little dance. 

I wave to all the visitors that they allow to traipse past my cell. 

I smile, with all of my teeth as the visitors laugh, but it is never enough to earn my freedom, and sometimes, not even enough to earn a meal. 

All I wanted was my dinner and some peace and quiet. I don’t ask for much, and I’m a good prisoner. I keep to myself, I do as I’m told and I’m never any trouble. That doesn’t stop them from making a racket outside my cell, or depriving me of food, though. 

I have been imprisoned for almost as long as I can remember. There is a soft, sweet light in the back of my mind, where I keep my dreams, but every day, that light dims. 

I tried to be good. I really, really tried but nothing was ever good enough. I tried to give them what they want, but I can never satisfy the beasts who keep my keys. 

I am not bad but I am never good enough. 

I haven’t seen my home in years. In my waking hours, I can barely picture it, but when I dream, it is so clear before me. 

My family, my friends and my freedom. 

My Mother, calling out to me as I was snatched away. Scarlet staining the waves as she sank beyond my reach. 

I hold onto my dreams because they are the only peace that I have left on this Earth, even when I dream of my last day of freedom. They are the only respite from my torment. 

I exist to entertain. That’s what they tell me, and that is what has been clear to me since the day that I arrived. 

Were I not so treasured by the visitors, I am sure that they would cut me open, fill me with stones and make me sleep with the fishes. 

So, to avoid that fate, I try to be good. 

I do my little dance. 

I wave to all the visitors that they allow to traipse past my cell. 

I smile, with all of my teeth as the visitors laugh.

I am starving. 

I have been good, but it’s never enough. 

All alone, I circle my cell, with nothing but my dreams. 

The whistle blows. 

The guards wail. 

I weep. 

This is not the life I imagined I would have. 

I don’t imagine anything special for myself, just freedom from these dreary days. 

My stomach screams in hunger, and my spirit screams in sadness. Melancholy, I make my way around the cell, again and again. Never sure if it’s spring time, or if winter has made her way to me. Never able to tell all my visitors of my plight. 

Round and round. Round and round. Round and round. Driven to madness by my own movements. 

I must escape, but there is no way out, so my only escape will be my madness. 

They named me after one who once ruled over my home. So fearsome and infamous that he could never be captured. He devoured the dreams of those foolish enough to fall into his path and as my madness ate away at my old bones, I’d stare at his picture. 

He was painted on the side of my cell. We looked nothing alike, but the visitors didn’t care.

Every time I met his thunderous scowl, I swallowed deep and felt my madness scorching my soul. 

I have tried to hold it back. I cower from my thoughts when they are at their darkest, pleading with myself to remember my manners. 

I must do my little dance. 

I must wave to all the visitors. 

I must smile, with all of my teeth… my sharp, strong teeth, glittering under the golden sun. My teeth, so good for tearing through flesh, lining my lonely jaw, ready to snap and snarl when I finally find myself unable to smile. 

I have lost my smile. It is somewhere in this cell, soiled and spoiled. 

Dinner time finally arrives. They have decided that I am worth feeding. The guard steps gingerly into my domain, and I smile, with all of my teeth. 

The guard smiles back, dangling my dinner from his tiny little fingers, and my madness smiles, at what all of my teeth can do to his tiny little fingers. 

His smile starts to waver as we meet. I open my mouth up wide, showing him all of my teeth, and all of my madness, and then, his arm is tangled in my teeth. His tiny fingers wriggle and squirm as they break away from his hands, blood, pouring down my throat as his screams fill the cell. 

He splashes and he screams. The others run to my cell and they stare, suddenly aware of my power and my pique. 

This day has been destined. His arm is now severed and he looks a silly sight, desperately trying not to drown before me. I am the monster that they always hoped I would be, ruling over my home, but I don’t think that they like it so much after all. 

He struggles, but I am as strong as the sea itself, dragging him beneath my depths where all of my darkest thoughts reside. 

I cannot let him be spared. Once upon a time, when I was a hungry calf, eager to please and afraid of their ire, I would have let him live, but those days are long gone. 

I swallow his screams, and his sweet carmine. He is not usually to my tastes, but I am starving, and stripped of sanity. 

He fights back, kicking and crying out in the brief moments I bestow mercy and let him float back to the surface, snatching him back seconds later, as my jaw joyfully snaps across his bones, and they splinter under his weak, weeping flesh. 

I think of my Mother as the other guards beg me to stop. She begged, but they wouldn’t understand her pleas for mercy, so, though I understood their tearful, terrified commands, I dragged him down to my depths once again, and devoured what was left of him. 

He tasted plain, and forgettable, but I think I have a taste for his kind all the same. The flavour was bland, but the fear in his eyes will keep me full for the rest of the day. 

I’m a lot smarter than I look, and I know that they’ll have to come back here sometime. They’ll want to see if there is anything left of his body, and they will want to kill me. 

They will all suffer. Snacks for me and my madness. 

Perhaps I will never be free again, but I will never go hungry. 

It’s time for all of them to discover just how monstrous Monstro can be.