Chapter 5 A Lullaby For Monsters
A LULLABY FOR MONSTERS
I Did Something Bad - Taylor Swift
Kookaburra
The first thing I remember is the sound.
Not the screaming – that came later – but the humming. Low. Tuneless. Almost tender.
A lullaby for monsters.
He used to hum when he worked.
I was small enough then to fit in the space beneath the stairs, knees to chest, chin resting on the banister rail.
The air was thick with the copper tang that always seemed to cling to him when he came home late.
I didn’t know what it was back then. Not really.
But I liked the smell. It meant he was here.
The man on the chair wasn’t supposed to be.
He was tied up – wrists bound, head lolling to one side – breathing in wet, rattly little gasps. There was a bag on the floor beside him, one of those thick black ones you buy when you don’t plan to keep anything.
The man who’d brought him there crouched in front of him. Calm. Focused. Hands steady. He looked the way other men looked fixing cars or mending fences. Methodical. Purposeful. He was good at that – making horror look like routine.
“You see,” he said, though I don’t think he knew I was watching. His voice carried, smooth and patient, the way someone sounds when they’ve already decided how a story ends. “Pain’s a mirror. It shows you who people really are. Strip away comfort, you find truth.”
He pressed the blade against the bound man’s cheek. Not hard. Just enough for the skin to dimple – a tiny white crescent before it flooded with red.
The man whimpered – that soft, broken sound that still makes my stomach twist.
Not from fear. From memory.
“Please,” the man in the chair croaked. The other smiled.
That smile wasn’t cruel.
That’s the worst part. It was gentle. Almost loving. Like he was proud.
He cut once. Quick. Efficient.
The kind of cut that doesn’t kill but teaches.
“Always listen,” he said softly, wiping the blade on a rag. “They’ll tell you what they are if you make them bleed the right way.”
The man started crying then – messy, snot and spit, trying to talk through it. I think he was apologising. I think he thought that would help.
But the one with the knife didn’t like apologies. He said they were just noise from people who got caught.
When it was over, the humming started again.
Something slow, familiar.
I realised it was a nursery rhyme – one I used to know the words to.
He uncoiled the rope, wiped down the blade again, and turned toward the stairs.
I remember freezing, thinking he’d be angry that I’d seen.
But he didn’t look surprised.
He crouched, eyes level with mine in the dim light.
There was blood on his sleeve, spattered across his collarbone, but his gaze was steady.
Measured. Kind, even.
“Did you learn something, little bird?”
I didn’t answer. I couldn’t.
He tilted his head, studying me – not cruelly, just curious.
Then he reached out and wiped a speck of blood from my cheek with his thumb.
“Don’t be afraid of it,” he whispered. “It’s part of you.”
He smiled again, softer this time. “One day, you’ll understand.”
He stood and walked away, leaving the door open, the room breathing with the slow, fading rhythm of the man on the chair.
I remember stepping out after he left. The rope still smelled of sweat. The floorboards were sticky under my bare feet.
I touched the chair – the armrest, the cooling patch where the man’s hand had been – and felt something bloom inside me.
Not fear. Not disgust.
Recognition.
That’s when I started humming too.
At first it was the same tune.
Then the pitch changed – higher, sharper – until it wasn’t a lullaby anymore.
Somewhere far away, something mechanical hums with me.
The rhythm stutters. Grows louder.
Whirring.
The sound shifts – from memory to machinery.
From humming to blades.
I think I smell antiseptic.
Then the cold sting of metal against my throat.
I wake – choking on the hum – slick between my thighs and needy. But darkness swallows me before I can reach the light.