There was definitely a monster under the floorboards. The girl knew it from the very first time she could leave her room.

She lived in a manor nestled deep in the forest. Around it, an empty wilderness stretched to the horizon and continued far beyond what the eye could see. There was only a single dirt road leading to and from the manor.

The girl had no friends, no neighbors, and no companions. She never got to go to school, nor did she get to play outside. Her parents had little time for her, but she was happy whenever they were around. She never saw them cook, but there was always food at the dinner table. But it was her home. A place of beautiful stars and fresh air, of tranquility tinged with slight loneliness.

Yet, it only remained peaceful in the summer. The winters were harsh, and the mornings were especially brutal. She would spend most of her days staring through the frost-covered windows, wondering what it was like to play. She spent the other days with her grandmother, reading the books that mysteriously appeared in front of her.

One night, as she rested her chin against her room’s chilly windowsill, she saw the monster scuttling in the glass’s reflection, a lumpy blob of shadow-laced eyes and gibbering mouths. But when she turned around, it was no longer there. She wasn’t afraid of the monster — it had always been there. Knowing that somebody was always watching made her happy.

The next day, the girl’s mother approached her with a knitted scarf and jacket.

“█████, I think you should play outside for a while. Mommy has something she needs to do.”

The girl was beyond happy. For the first time, she could play with her parents like all the other girls in the stories she read. She bounded out the heavy double doors, across the gardens and crystal mounds, and slipped through the iron bars of the front gates, pale breath drifting in the air. It was a clear blue sky day, and she played in the snow until she couldn’t feel her hands.

But that didn’t matter to her. She made a girl sized snowman and stood proudly beside her work. And somewhere, she knew the shadow was watching too. She only noticed that her mother never came out when she looked back at the manor, some time later.

The manor was quiet when she crept back through the front doors. The girl called out for her mother, but there was no reply.

She found her parents in the kitchen. Her mother was leaning on the table, panting and whimpering. Her father was on the ground, and there were trickles of something coming from his head.

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She could only make out a trace of her father’s face — the rest was covered in blood. His blood, her mother’s blood, some other’s blood. It was everywhere.

“Oh,” the girl realized. “I can see daddy’s brain.”

Her mother’s face was crawling with shadows. Something burned half her body to a black char, and she held something in her hand. It caught the pinpricks of yellow light from the nearby candles, a tube of chrome and plastic.

"█████, I’m so sorry…”

Her mother aimed the thing at her, but she couldn’t understand why. The air reeked of sweet melted fat and burnt hair smell. And her mother was crying and sobbing, eyes rimmed with red, but the girl didn’t understand. At that point in time, there was no way she could understand.

Her mother pulled the trigger, but the shadows lept from behind the table and jerked the gun upwards in the same moment. Bang. Her eyes widened to perfect circles, and she fell backwards on top of daddy. A fine red mist hung in the air, illuminated by dim candlelight. The back of her mother’s skull opened up like a rose blossom.

The girl nudged her parents, but they didn’t move. Both of their hands were still warm, but they were still. Closing her eyes, she ran towards the workshop where her grandmother dwelled. She didn’t understand the emotions in her chest. Did she feel sadness? Confusion? Was it grief? The whirlwind of feelings in her chest never went away after that.

Trying to wipe the tears from her eyes, the girl burst into her grandmother’s workshop.

Her grandmother was a witch that could do anything. The girl had never seen magic before and knew it was just made up nonsense, but her grandma knew many things. She didn’t follow common sense. If anybody could fix this, it would be her grandma. Grandma even knew the monster.

“You want to save them, even though they killed each other, then tried to kill you?” Grandma replied, surprised.

“Please help them,” the girl begged.

She pleaded sincerely. It was the only thing she could think of asking for. The girl didn’t know how difficult it would be to fix the situation, but the witch merely granted her request. A ritual was prepared in the workshop without question, with the inevitability of a falling guillotine blade.

The girl sat there and watched. And watched. And watched. Watched. Watched. And watched. Watched.

“Oh dear,” her grandmother said.

Then she noticed it. Her parent’s hands were growing cold. She was holding the hands of corpses.

The emotions the girl didn’t understand tore her apart from the inside out.

“Their souls have already fled. What a bother. Suppose I need a new scion, eventually, then.”

The girl understood nothing she had seen. But an idea took root in her head that day.

From that moment, she understood that life, once extinguished, could never return. And she understood that life is but a fleeting, transient thing that can disappear arbitrarily.

That day, the emotions in the girl’s chest shredded apart what little self she had built up in her short life. In her final moments, she cried out for anything that could help her understand.

And from the shadows, the monster reached out and sank into her very soul.

Thus, the girl died. And something else took her place.