When she picked Eli up from school, he didn't say a word. When she dropped him off at the boys club, he simply got out of the car and didn't look back. That night, at six, when she came to pick him up again, he got in the car and spent the ride home staring out the window at nothing in particular.

By the time they arrived at home, Susan had had enough.

"What is it, Eli? I'm just trying to help. Why are you so upset with me?"

Eli, who'd been on his way up to his room, looked back at her and said, "Because you won't let me do my job."

And then he marched up the stairs and disappeared behind his bedroom door.

* * *

Eli stuck with the silent treatment for the rest of the night. At dinner, he didn't answer any of his parent's questions. He just kept peering out the window with an expression mixed of fear and frustration. Susan questioned her husband about it afterwards.

"It's just a phase, hun," was his reply.

Later, when Susan went upstairs to tuck Eli in, she heard him crying. She opened his door to find him sitting on his bed, tears running down his cheeks. She ran in and sat beside him.

"What is it, honey?" she asked, wiping his tears away.

"They were laughing at me!" he blubbered.

"Who?" she asked, fearing that she already knew the answer.

"The monsters! There's no one to stop them anymore! There were so many, and they were laughing and saying that something awful was going to happen to dad!"

Susan rocked him back and forth soothingly. "Nothing's going to happen to dad, Eli. I won't let anything happen. If I see any monsters, I promise I'll take care of them. Okay? Everything is going to be all right."

Eli nodded, but he knew that everything was not going to be all right. His mom couldn't even see the monsters. She had no way to stop them.

* * *

Susan left the room feeling aggravated. Eli was really stuck on this, and she didn't know what to do. It seemed like the more she tried to help, the more she pushed him away. But he wasn't growing out of this on his own, and she couldn't just sit back and watch. She sighed. She was too tired to think about it anymore tonight. Maybe some answers would come with the morning.

On her way down the stairs, she bumped her funny-bone against one of the posts.

* * *

The next day, while Susan was vacuuming, she received the most frightening phone call of her life. Thomas was in the hospital. On his way home from work, he'd gotten into a wreck. It turned out, to her immediate relief, that the accident wasn't incredibly serious, and that they'd only be holding Thomas overnight to be careful, but it still left her shaking.

That night, on the way home from the boys club, Susan decided to ask her son some questions.

"Eli, your father is in the hospital. He got in a car accident."

Emmett didn't looked surprised by the news, only sad.

"I want you to tell me how you knew something bad was going to happen to him."

"I already told you-the monsters said so. You won't let me fight them anymore, and they're building up. At dinner last night, I saw nine of them out in the backyard, and four were big."