The Black Beast

Date: 12/4/2025

There’s a knock at the door — three taps, frantic, like someone who’s just run across seven counties carrying seven children. I open it to find Ash, cheeks glowing, hair tied up with what I hope is a pencil but deeply suspect is an Allen key. “Just a fly-by visit,” she announces, already in the hallway, scattering her energy like wood shavings after a particularly enthusiastic drill sesh. “Places to be, Children to raise, DIY to conquer.” Seven boys. Seven. I’m honestly surprised that her uterus hasn’t faked its own death by now. Her toolkit clanks at her side like a sheriff’s holster. She slaps a stray bit of plaster off her arm. “Who needs a man?” she beams. This from a woman who once removed a radiator and nearly opened the first indoor swimming pool powered exclusively by regret. “Show Mat your cupboards,” I say. Her beloved built-ins. Midnight blue, brass trimmings — Victorian elegance meets ‘I learned this from YouTube at 2 a.m.’ Ash hands Mat her phone. Mat, being Mat, decides this is the perfect moment to betray all social norms. He plugs her phone into his laptop and begins downloading every single photo on her camera roll, including — unfortunately — the spicy ones. “Mat…” she warns. “One sec,” he replies. “Only 2,357 more images.” My soul rolls its eyes and leaves the room. She yanks the cord so hard I swear I hear the laptop whimper. “What do you think of Ash’s DIY?” I ask, desperate to glue the atmosphere back together. “Meh.” Ash looks like someone has kicked her in her spiritual shin. “Let’s chat outside,” I say, because I genuinely don’t want to be responsible for Mat’s imminent funeral. We step out. Fresh air. Peace. Normality. Then I see it. The front door. Wide open. Gloriously, recklessly ajar. “Oh SHIT — Monkey!” My ginger and white Tom. The pampered puss. The cat who believes the front garden is essentially The Purge. “Monkey!” I call. “Dreamies!” The sacred word. Usually he sprints from any dimension like a food-motivated demon. Today — silence. Then I hear a yowl. A horrible, war-torn yowl. My heart flips, somersaults, then belly-flops. “MONKEY!” I bolt down the street like a concerned parent on Sports Day. I brace myself for the Black Beast — our neighbourhood bully cat. A hulking shadow of a creature. Looks like he eats tin cans and broken dreams for breakfast. He terrorises Monkey daily, treats our house like an all-you-can-eat buffet, then sits on our wall with the smugness of a landlord. But when I find the source of the commotion — It’s Monkey. My Monkey. My butter-wouldn’t-melt kitten. My innocent little prince. He is mid-battle, ears flattened, unleashing the fury of all his suppressed anxieties at a terrified cat. “Monkey!” I gasp. Hands on hips. The stance of a mother who is two seconds from grounding him for life. A man rushes forwards, eyes puddling with tears. “Get your stinking cat away from my baby!” he sobs. His “baby” is strapped to his chest in a baby carrier. A fully grown cat. Legs poking through each hole like a feline starfish. I try not to laugh. I really, truly do. “I’m so, so sorry,” I tell him. “He never usually ventures into… well…anywhere.” He tuts, kisses his cat’s nibbled ear, and storms off, the baby sling swaying indignantly. The scene peels slides sideways and suddenly I’m at the Tip Shop. My idea of heaven — the glorious afterlife of disregarded furniture. But the real spectacle here is the man behind the counter — bushy hair, shirt that hasn’t been ironed since 1998 — who appears to be having a fully-fledged conversation with thin air, or perhaps the spirits of broken microwaves? “Should’ve known she was possessed when she hissed at the hoover,” he mutters. Mum, thinking he’s talking to her, offers kindly, “Oh love, everyone gets a bit feral around housework. I once growled at a steam mop.” He keeps going, oblivious to the living human beings in the room. “She hid my car keys in the freezer for three months. Said the spirits told her cold metal travels faster.” Mum nods sagely. “Well she’s not wrong, dear. That’s basic science. Or witchcraft. They overlap.” He twitches, still having a full seance with the broken lamp. “Reckon if she ever comes back, she’ll crawl out of a vent. Like mould. Or vengeance.” Mum, mishearing entirely: “Well rent is going up everywhere, dear. Tell her to speak to a broker.” Then, suddenly — like his brain has spun off the motorway — he mutters: “Reckon I'd look good in crotchless chaps?’ Mum, without a beat: “Well, it depends on the leg shape, my darling!” Mum goes pale. “Oh God, she whispers “he’s… he’s not talking to us, is he?” “No,” I whisper. “No, he absolutely is not.” He keeps going, having a full-blown heated debate with thin air. I begin edging us towards the exit before his rambling escalates into full-blown erotica. On the way out, Mum stands frozen in front of a £40 wardrobe, clutching her chest like the price tag has slapped her. “That’s daylight robbery,” Mum gasps. The scene collapses again, dragging me away from the tip-shop man muttering to ghosts, leaving behind broken lamps, invisible curses, and Mum nodding like it all made perfect sense. And now I’m at school. “We’re really worried about Alex,” the teacher says. The dread in her eyes is enough to stop my heart. She leads me to a window. “Watch him.” Outside, my son spins in small, lonely circles. Thirteen one day, six the next. Kids peel away from him like he’s contagious. He reaches out — connection, friendship, anything — and they scatter, laughing. The sadness wraps around me like a heavy, wet coat. And then — he drops. Straight to the ground. “Oh my GOD!” I cry. “He keeps falling asleep,” the teacher explains. “Mid sandwich last week. Face first.” Guilt claws up my throat. Maybe I let him stay up too late. Maybe he’s exhausted. Maybe — Later at home, he falls asleep face-first into his pizza. I lift his cheesy little head. “Alex,” I whisper. “Let's get you to bed.” He nods, too tired to speak. I scoop him up and carry him upstairs. I tuck him in, smoothing his hair. He sighs — small, warm, peaceful. For a moment. Then I see it. A tear in his sleeve. Tiny claw marks. Not human. My stomach twists. Something scratches at the front door downstairs. Monkey, I think. Please be Monkey. Then a deeper sound joins it — low, rumbling, almost growled. A shadow moving in the gap beneath the door. Broad. Darkness pressed into a cat’s shape. The Black Beast. The embodiment of everything Monkey fears. Everything I fear. It prowls. Waiting. As if the door — left open so casually — was always meant for it. Behind me, Alex murmurs in his sleep. “Dreamies…” The scratching stops. A silhouette shifts. Large. Patient. Listening. And in the narrow crack of the doorframe, two eyes shine back at me. Not Monkey’s warm amber, but hungry, predatory black. Waiting for the moment I’m not looking.