Beholder's Eye

He lived in a cave under The Bridge. Every morning he would wake up to the water yapping nearby, smooth, silent, lovely. He would groan, and stretch his arms out, his knobby knees groaning under his weight, and the attempts to follow his brothers on their hunts from the night before. He would stare into the water, sparkling as it was, beautiful, washing his face. He would look at his face, and wish he were anyone else. He did not want to be confined to this body, lithe and tall, and graceful. He did not want to be attached to this face, acquine as it was. Sharp around the edges. He would stare at the water and wish he were anywhere else. Stare at the sun in the morning sky.

His father would mock him over breakfast for how ugly he was, his well defined features, his jawline, the lack of rocks and stones jutting out of his face. His mother would hug him, he would run into her arms for comfort, but sometimes he thought she too would shudder at the sight of him. When he went to the forest, the little creatures would not be scared of him. Worse, the humans were not scared of him. The humans. He shuddered to think of that too. When he went on his first scare, the ones that were crossing The Bridge, some idiots would always cross, unbelievers, risk takers, adrenaline junkies, they would always cross and destroy the sanctity of The Bridge. When he tried to scare them, nothing, they looked at him, and said some words, which even now he didn't want to admit it to himself, a horrendous shudder went up his round spine at least that was like the others, he thought they had thought he was oneofthem. There he thought it. Didn't make it true, but it was the first time he had let that thought cross his mind. It was a scary one though. When he went hunting with his brothers at night - they usually let him trail along, not paying any heed to him anymore - he knew the yellow eyes of the owls, and the small eyes under the tree holes, and all of the eyes of the forest were watching and laughing their laughs at the sight of him, and sometimes he was scared by them. Sometimes he would be angry. He was not a fearful creature. He did not inspire fear. He was born that way, it was not his fault but it was his fault, and everyone made it a point to tell him so.

Gave him remedies, “drink the blood of a squirming rat two hours before the full moon”, “kill a squirrel and force it’s brethren to eat it”, “tear apart a human limb from limb”. He was ready to explode. All these things were jumbled inside his head, like his face was jumbled. And he was not beautiful like the others. And they never let him live it down. One day he would terrorize them all. One day. You’ll see. Everyone will see.