Sincerely, Jennifer x

The children stopped eating in August. Not one by one, but all at once. Every child under twelve in this town eschewed food at the beginning of the month, with no rhyme or reason. 

My surgery was suddenly full to the brim of hysterical parents, wondering why little Timmy and Tabatha were on hunger strike, and I examined each one, baffled and bewildered. 

They would not eat, or drink, insisting and explaining with a chilling calmness that it was not time to do so. 

The town had a sorrowful stillness. The parks were empty. The schools 

My brother begged me for help, but what could I do? Children all over town were maligned by the madness, beginning to weaken, but their resolve remained strong. The children began to skip school, sleeping most of the day, sobbing with pain and hunger, but refusing even the smallest of morsels. 

The only thing that could rouse them from their beds was their favourite television show. It had held sway over the small ones for such a long time, that nobody really thought about it. 

The Great Gourmand was a ropey, half hour cringe fest, as far as I, and most adults were concerned, but the children adored it. Gourmand was a magician, with a passion for cooking, and I think we all just let the children watch it because it had no swearing or bad influences. 

It wasn’t a problem. Just a middle aged man in a cheap, sparkly suit, keeping the kids quiet for a little while. 

Who could it harm? A silly, low budget show about a cooking magician? 

“Do you love me, boys and girls?” He would cry, to rapturous applause and cheers from the small studio audience. “Do I love you, boys and girls?” The dated decor would peel on the walls, but the children would holler and hoot in response to his every word. He’d giggle and beguile them with card tricks and slide whistles. It made no sense why the children loved him so, but they adored him all the same. “Are you hungry, boys and girls?” He would drop his gaze, shuffling his feet as they screamed a definitive response. “But my babies…” He crowed, catching the camera with his gaze and fixing his fuschia stare upon the watching children. “It’s not time!”

His eyes had always bothered me actually. Probably just contact lenses for drama, I told myself, but the way he would always glare down the camera, with a strange smile, had always chilled me more than I’d like to admit. 

The children would rise for their favourite show, and then skulk back to bed as soon as it ended. Nothing about it made sense. I couldn’t understand, but even though I had no answers, I still agreed to see my niece again yesterday afternoon. 

Nobody answered the door. I could see the car in the driveway, and a light on in one of the bedrooms, so I knew they were home, but strangely, they didn’t answer. I shrugged, shoving my key into the lock and letting myself in, slightly stunned by the silence and darkness as I entered the house. 

There was no sign of my brother, or his wife, but there had been a struggle. This was not the normal household untidiness you’d expect from a young family. There had been trouble. 

As I stepped over the spilled toys and quietly crept through the hallway, I could hear the television from upstairs, wincing slightly as I spotted a splodge of blood on the bannister of the stairs. 

“Do you love me, boys and girls?” A small cheer from my niece up ahead, in between gentle whimpering that seemed to come from another. “Do I love you, boys and girls?” I slowly climbed the stairs, knowing that perhaps I should call out to her, but suddenly wracked with apprehension at the idea. “Are you hungry, boys and girls?” She was just a child. Barely even old enough to go to school. She was no danger to me, surely. Surely! I had to believe it. I definitely believed it, and yet, as my eyes fell upon more blood, slowly soaking into the carpet, and the sound of chewing began to fill my unwelcoming ears, I began to wonder. “Then you must eat my darlings, and grow big and strong.”

I watched my niece with curiosity and revulsion as I reached the top of the stairs and stared with disbelief into her open bedroom door. 

My brother and his wife were before her, stomachs split open as she dipped her dainty little hands into their insides and dined, like a true gourmand. 

My answering machine was full of similar stories when I got back to the office. I hid under my desk, listening to each one, and begging for them not to be true. 

The children had begun to eat again, but there were no parents left to care. Tots with square eyes stared at their screens, uninterrupted, shovelling their genes into their gobs with a grin. 

He cannot be stopped. We let them watch him, but we have no idea what he is. Nobody can actually find the studio where the show is filmed, or find out how he even made it to air. The episodes are just emailed, and put on by the network. Nobody questioned it, nobody thought about it. They just wanted quiet, compliant children, and sitting them in front of the television was always the easiest way. 

He moved online after the network pulled the show. Everywhere the children look, on their phones and iPads, he is waiting, with the big smile that they have come to adore. 

There is no way out. I’ve tried everything to get the children back, but they belong to The Great Gourmand now. 

They eat at his command, watching with wide eyes for his affections and his instructions. He is everywhere, and to them, he is everything. Us? Well, we are simply delicious, if he wishes it so.