Difficult Child

DIFFICULT CHILD

  by Shelly Donacy

  Copyright 2013 Shelly Donacy

  My gratitude to publicdomainpictures.net for the use of my cover background, from https://www.publicdomainpictures.net/view-image.php?image=37956&picture=empty-grocery-store&large=1

  Dedication

  To my mother and all the others who I survived despite.

  "Alouette, gentille alouette. Alouette, je te plumerai."

  DIFFICULT CHILD

  Jayden had been having a dream. Every night it was the same dream but when he awoke it evaporated. Was it a good dream or was it a nightmare? Jayden could not say. All he knew was that one moment he was where he belonged and the next, he was not. This made Jayden very sad.

  In most respects Jayden was a typical five year old boy. He liked bugs, games and toys. But most especially he liked unique toys. His small oddly shaped room in the house's eaves was filled with windups, carved wood and marionettes. His grandmother said he was an old soul born in the wrong age. His mother was a practical Christian woman who didn't believe in all of that ancient New Age nonsense. To her Jayden had always been a dishonest, cruel and difficult child. The extent of his dishonesty usually had something to do with whether or not he had watched one of those Satanic cartoons on the children's network. She considered any inconvenience he caused her a personal cruelty. Jayden was difficult because he was gifted and eccentric, though when his advanced mental faculties brought her praise I must admit she was quick to append difficult with an "if gifted child".

  Today Jayden had passed the time much like any other summer day. The better part of the afternoon he spent with his granmother since his mom worked as a telemarketer and there was no one else to watch him. As the June sun began to set, he was dropped back at home where his mother had promptly sat in front of the television. Jayden was dressed as always in his button-up plaid shirt, khakis and loafers but he waited patiently for his mother to get ready. How it took her two hours to shower, put on a running suit, and not even wash her hair he could not fathom but he knew if he questioned her again he would get the same grouchy response. When he heard her feet creek on the upstairs hall, he clicked the television from a CG ghost to a channel portraying a poorly drawn cartoon Jesus. Last time she had caught him watching one of those Satanic cartoons she had not bought him his new toy. Jayden sat out left overs for his mom so she wouldn't take any more time bumbling about the kitchen. As it was they never had enough time at the store.

  "You can buy one toy and only one," his mother told him in the minivan. "And no temper tantrums, understood?" She waited for his streetlight halloed nod in the rear view mirror. "Good boy. Remember, what would Jesus do?"

  Jayden's mom shopped for her latest health fads while he searched for his one toy. Coincidentally this week it was Goji berry supplements which put her in much closer proximity to the toy aisle. Last week it was wheat grass smoothies. Just between you, Jayden and the the toys, he liked the berries better.

  He searched the rows of cheap plastic action figures, knowing the really interesting ones his mother would never allow him to have. He looked over the dolls, remembering his mom's reaction when he had asked for one of those undead girls. Despite his mother's prodding, he had never had an interest in the tiny toy cars. By the time Jayden had reached the board games he had all but made up his mind to go back for an army man. Then he saw it, there without packaging or label, in a spot marked for some game called Goose Feathers: a retro jack-in-the-box! Its wooden head was bobbing back and forth on the spring beneath its cloth body. He grabbed the metal box and pushed it shut. He turned the little wooden peg on the crankshaft and was surprised to hear not just music box workings but also a hollow voice singing along in a different language:

  "Alouette, gentille alouette. Alouette, je te plumerai.

  "Je te plumerai les yeux. Je te plumerai les yeux.

  "Et les yeux! Et les yeux! Et le bec! Et le bec!

  "Et la tête! Et la tête! Alouette! Alouette!

  "A-a-a-ah"

  There was something familiar about the box and about the song. It made Jayden happy and sad at the same time. Had he been a little older he may have described the sensation as longing or nostalgia.

  Jayden turned the box around and sounded out the letters F-R-A-N-C-E and the numbers 1-6-6-6. This was utterly amazing! Not just a vintage toy but a medieval toy from France! As he looked up, Jayden noticed a night stocker on the end of the aisle turn suddenly and walk away. He didn't get a good look at the man's face but he was dirty, hairy, dressed in work clothes and Jayden was sure the man had been watching him play with the toy. He was suddenly scared despite his level head and set the jack-in-the-box back on the shelf to run and get his mother.

  Along the way, Jayden's reason began to override his fear. What if he had imagined the man watching him? He knew his mom would react in one of two ways: she would attach him to her hip or she would find the man and confront him and probably get them kicked out of the store. Either way, Jayden would miss out on his toy. His mom was down the organic aisle looking at cereal that tasted like the nests of the birds on the box.

  "Jayden! No running in the store," his mom looked him up and down. "Why are you so excited."

  "I found this really cool old toy from France!"

  "Well," his mom raised a frowning eyebrow. "Where is it?"

  "I left it on the aisle, come see." He grabbed her hand and pulled her along.

  "I have other shopping to do, Jayden. And the store's about to close. Show me and lets finish shopping."

  "It'll only take a minute, mommy..." Jayden stopped in his loafers. They had reached the game aisle and come to the spot on the shelf marked 'Goose Feathers'. Only, instead of a vintage jack-in-the-box, the spot was filled with game boxes illustrating cartoonish plucked geese running around on their tippy-toes.

  "Well, Jayden?" His mother pulled her hand away so it could join the other hand on her cocked hips.

  "It was right here, mom. Only it was old and didn't have any packaging." Jayden felt behind the boxes but they stretched all the way to the back of the shelf.

  She rolled her eyes. "It probably belongs to somebody else and they came back for it. Okay?"

  "Okay mom," Jayden couldn't help but pout his bottom lip.

  "Now, I'm going to grab the last few things we need. Go find something else and meet me up at the register. How about one of those super neat cars?"

  Jayden watched his mother walk down the aisle and turn the corner. As if on cue, the moment she was out of sight the speakers overhead crackled to life.

  "Attention shoppers, the store will be closing in fifteen minutes. Please make your final selections and proceed to check-stand six. You wouldn't want to get locked in now would you."

  Chills goose-bumped Jayden's skin from his cowlick all the way to his toes. The voice over the intercom spoke with an unmistakable accent, hollow and mechanical.

  "Alouette, gentille alouette. Alouette, je te plumerai..." Jayden whipped around toward the sound of the deep, gruff voice and saw the back of the hairy stocker as he pushed a broom passed the end of the aisle. Jayden could feel himself beginning to hyperventilate. He ran out the other side of the aisle and hid against the end cap until he heard the man's voice muffle through the swinging doors into the back of the store.

  Calming ever so slightly, Jayden began to shake. He didn't want the jack-in-box now. He wanted his mommy and he wanted his bed. He would go grab the army man and meet his mother at the register.

  He walked the two aisles over, looking around each end-cap to make sure there were no hairy men. Convinced the coast was clear, Jayden all but ran down the action figure aisle. His head was on a swivel, scanning both ends of his manufactured canyon. He reached out his hand to the
break in the faced rows where he knew his army man had been, only instead of cardboard packaging his hand touched tin.

  "Alouette, gentille alouette. Alouette, je te plumerai..." The jack-in-box began to play against the impact of his finger tips, its cloth body spasming on its spring in laughter at the terror in his eyes. "You wouldn't want to get locked in now would you?"

  Jayden reeled away to run toward the front of the store and was shocked to find his way blocked by the hairy man in dirty work clothes.

  "Do not worry, Alouette. You will be home soon." The man's deep, accented voice sounded painfully dry. His hair was matted, his face dripped sweat; his blue eyes shone with a glassy, feverish mania; a thick black fluid drooled out over his bottom lip and down his beard.

  Jayden spun around to run the other way only to find his way guarded by a throng of nightstockers. The women wore course