Molten (Archive)

A very good friend of mine has a young daughter that she's raising on her own. They live about a mile from me so I see them a fair amount. I'm not really fond of kids, which I think I've mentioned before, but this one is pretty alright. She's about five and she's really taken a shine to me for some reason, so she stays over at my place sometimes. Gives her mom a bit of a break to go do other things.

A few months ago she came over to spend a few days with me; mom was going out of town on a little mini-vacation and I offered to take Ash. She showed up with a big backpack and a sleeping bag and a little indoor tent. She said she wanted to camp in the living room. Her mom is also a Ranger, so Ash knows a lot about the outdoors. She was going through a camping obsession and knew I'd indulge her. We spent most of the afternoon out on the trails behind the house, her pointing at everything and talking at me non-stop, me holding the field guide she'd brought "just in case." We had dinner and watched a documentary, and I set up the tent for her in the middle of the room. She conked out relatively early, so I went into the bedroom to work for a while.

Around two I heard the tent zipper, and I figured she was going to the bathroom, but she took a left and stood in the doorway. I asked her what was up, and she shuffled over to climb on my lap, which kind of startled me. Ash isn't an overly physical kid, doesn't like hugs or kisses, and she'd never gotten on my lap before. I waited for her to tell me what was going on. Her face was puffy and there was a feather stuck in her hair.

"I can't sleep." She mumbled.

"Why?" I said.

She looked over at the door and sighed and leaned her head against me. "That shiny man."

"Shiny man?" I repeated.

"He's noisy. And he's bright. The light's in my eyes. He's too noisy."

I thought about that while she fell asleep. I brought her back to the living room and maneuvered her back in the tent without waking her up. I didn't see anything strange so I went to bed. I figured she'd had a weird dream.

About a month later she came to spend the night again but she didn't bring her tent so I put her in the bedroom like usual. We'd had a long day, and as soon as she was asleep I got set up on the couch and passed out. At some point she shook me awake.

I woke up and turned over. "Huh?"

"I need a blanket please." She said.

"You cold?" I sat up.

"He wants one."

I stood up and turned on the light. "Who does?"

"That shiny man. He's cold."

I took her hand and we went back into the bedroom. I didn't see anything but she kept talking about a blanket so I got one from the closet. I wasn't really listening until she grabbed the blanket and went to the window. She held it up and put her nose right on the glass.

"Here!" She said. "Now he'll stop crying."

I could feel this strange kind of unease building. Something wasn't sitting right. I went to the window and nudged her aside so I could look out.

"Where is he?" I asked. I didn't see anything.

"Oh he went back but he'll come down again." Ash said.

I only half-heard her. "He's a friend?"

She shook her head hard enough to make her hair fly. "No."

"Is he Mom's?"

Ash's father has been stalking her mother for years, and he's tried to manipulate Ash before. Promising her toys if she says bad things about her mom, that sort of thing. I was starting to wonder if he was the man, trying to get her to open the window so he could snatch her. I pulled the blinds shut and got down so I could talk to her seriously, eye-to-eye.

"Is it her friend?" I asked again, but she shook her head.

"No."

"Does he want you to go outside?" I was listening for any kind of noise, watching for the motion-activated lights to go off.

"He's cold." She said.

"Is he old? Or is he like me?" I tried.

She shook her head. "I don't know. His face is all melty."

"Melty?"

"It got melted one side and now it's melty and shiny. He's cold, he won't let me sleep, so we have to give him that blanket. Okay?"

"I don't understand, what's 'shiny'?" I said.

She took off toward the kitchen and I followed. She was going through one of the drawers and talking about how he was a sad man, and she felt bad that he was cold. I heard a metallic wobbling sound and she stood up with a piece of tinfoil. She pulled one side of her face down with her hand, turning her lower eyelid out and yanking her mouth into an unsettling grimace. Then she pressed the tinfoil against her skin.

"Like that!" She explained. "But it's watery and sometimes he spits it out."

She stood there with half her face pressed to the tinfoil and I had no idea what to say except to ask the obvious.

"Where does he come from?"

She dropped the foil and went to the bedroom. She pressed her nose against the window again. "He comes down. Down from there." She pointed to the treeline. "And he was window and he was- 'I'm cold, I'm cold.' But he's all steaming and shiny." We both looked out the window but the yard was empty. She yawned hugely and got back in the bed and closed her eyes. "The blanket's gonna get all shiny too." Within seconds she was asleep again. I watched and listened for a while but nothing came to the window. She went home the next morning and I didn't tell her mom about anything. I needed time to piece things together. Unfortunately, once they were connected, I couldn't take them apart.

The man who came to her window was covered in molten metal. He came from the trees and walked to the window, where he stood and told her that he was cold, so cold. Molten metal, I've learned, destroys the nerves, incinerates them on contact. What's left is shock, the sensation of intense, unbearable cold, and a small eternity before the water in the body explodes outwards and the flesh evaporates in a cloud of vapor.

Ashe still comes over, and the shiny man still visits. I'm a heavy sleeper, but lately I've taken to wearing earplugs at night when I'm alone.