Under My Bed

• Daniel Batarseh, Grade 5
• Short Story
• 2021

Do you know what's under your bed? Well, I don’t. Last night I heard some weird noises coming from under my bed. What could they be?
“Jack go clean your room,” asked mum.
But Jack replied, “wait mum let me finish this level on Fortnight.”
Oh, fine but hurry up, Mum said.
Jack passed the level then he went to clean his room, but he didn’t dare to clean under his bed because he thinks strange creatures are living there! Was he right?
When he finished cleaning his horrible mess, he went downstairs to tell mum that he finished cleaning. Then, mum asked Jack to get the dusty book from under his bed. He was thinking, oh mum, do I have to do it? Jack was frightened and worried that the creatures would crawl out and eat him!
Jack went to tell mum he was scared to put his hand under his bed, but mum knew that, so she helped him overcome his fear by saying, “hey Jack I’ll come with you to see what’s under your creepy bed.”
Jack tried to put one hand under the bed while holding his mum’s hand with the other one. As soon as he touched the book, a weird thing touched him! He was so terrified that he ran as fast as lightning to the other side of the room. His mum put her hand under his bed to get the book, but a spider bit her. It was painful so she went to get a medicine.
She rang the pest control and told him to spray the whole house top to bottom just in case the spider ran speedy to another bed. Once he came to spray the house and especially under the bed, Jack’s mum told him to get the messy book from under the medium-sized bed. When he gave her the book, Jack asked, what was so special about the book? She replied, “This book belongs to our family, it's a memory book.” When they opened it, a venomous spider jumped out to try and bite him. Luckily, Jack was a fast thinker and he got out of the way before the spider bit him.
They thought all insects died but this one was still alive inside the book. They killed the last spider by stepping on it and they both felt happy and relieved. Over dinner, they were looking at the old photos and how young they looked. Mum was so happy that she even asked Jack to get donuts, his favourite dessert which they enjoyed while going through their memories.