Poem: "The Girl He Brought Home"
This poem came out of the October 18, 2011 bonus fishbowl. It was inspired by prompts from rix_scaedu and eseme. It was sponsored by rix_scaedu. "The Girl He Brought Home" belongs to the Monster House series and comes after " Not Mine." You can find other poems in this series via the Serial Poetry page.
The Girl He Brought Home
When our son was seven,
he brought home a girl for the first time.
Her name was Melinda,
and they had a class project together.
She didn't say anything,
but she looked vaguely familiar.
"Does she live around here?"
I asked.
"She used to, I think,"
he said with a shrug.
"Now she lives with her grandmother
since her parents died when she was little."
Just then the bogeyman walked in,
not realizing that we had a guest.
He took one look at her and froze.
"Mister!" said Melinda.
She wrapped her arms around his legs.
Slowly he lifted a hand
to stroke the smooth black hair
that fell to her waist.
I remembered the toddler
that the bogeyman had brought here
several years ago. "I thought
you only worked with bad boys and girls,"
I said to him.
"Well," the bogeyman muttered,
"I might have checked up on her
once or twice..."
"... a year," added the lurking shadow
in a stage whisper.
Melinda hid a smile
as she pressed herself
against the bogeyman's side.
"She doesn't talk much,"
our son said.
"Oh, you have a snake!"
Melinda said, and scampered over
to make cute hissy noises at the radiator dragon.
"Except to reptiles,"
our son added. "She talks to
the teacher's pet boa constrictor."
"That's nice," I said to him,
watching Melinda lean over the radiator.
"So can we go work on our project now?"
he asked. I nodded,
and they headed up the stairs
toward the library room.
The bogeyman stared after them
with a forlorn look on his face.
"Don't worry," I said
as I patted him on the shoulder.
"I get the feeling
that we'll be seeing more of her."