8-Ball

My boy gets £1.50 pocket money a week. You can snub that all you like, but we're not a rich family. My wife left me 2 and a half years ago, taking most of my money and the car. She doesn't care about the kid, she's far too occupied by her buff new boyfriend. I hear he's got tattoos, and they'e going on holiday to Greece soon. That must be nice. I'm happy for them.
Anyway, the kid normally drags me to the pound shop to pick up a tacky toy that falls apart within a week, and then to this classic old sweet shop to spend his change on teeth-rotters. I like weekends, as unlike the weekdays I can spend time with him.

So we were browsing the isles of discount tat, when we came to the toys. Now normally a good 10 minuets is spent here as the kid chooses whether he wants the police hat with the plastic baton, or the army guy hat with the toy gun. I turned to browse the cheap garden stuffs, when I felt a tug on my arm. He had a little toy 8-ball in his hands, and was already wiggling it up and down to see all the alternative answers. I remember having one myself as a child, the famed "magic 8-ball" that could read your mind, but this one here was tacky and plastic. Even the messages that floated up out of the black were fuzzy and smudged, I could barely read what they said at this angle. The kid can be darn persistent at times, even when I told him it'd just break, and we ended up getting the thing. The only odd thing that happened was that instead of going our normal route to the sweet shop, He wanted to go straight home to play with the ball. This subtle change of routine certainly registered, but at the time I thought nothing of it.

"Hello"
I froze like a deer caught in the headlights of the TV in the otherwise pitch black room. I looked again and squinted, the 8-ball that I had knocked with my foot clearly read "Hello". snapping on the desk light, I brought it up to read it again.
"Hello".
Maybe the kid had tampered with it somehow, he had been pretty resilient to give the damn thing up before he went to bed. Maybe because it was late and maybe because I was alone, I felt like this ball was company. Tentatively I shook it again, not even bothering to ask a question, just to see if it had any other wacky answers.
"Yes"
Ah, that was normal, or so I thought. The hazy ink-water inside swirled again without me even shaking the damn thing.
"I have answers".
What the hell? Did it just answer a question I had in my mind!? I threw it into the armchair across the room, deciding that I was just too tired and must be seeing things. I'd come back to it in the morning, and with that I heaved myself out of the chair, flicking the light off on my way upstairs.

"Good morning".
The 8-ball was on my bedside table, facing me. I rubbed the sleep out of my eyes, and gave myself a few pinches to see if I was dreaming still. No, I was still awake and the ball was real. Okay... This was weird now. I'd seen way too many horror films to trust creepy trinkets that seem innocent and then suddenly appear when you least expect them and demon things appear and kill you. I sat up in bed, planning to drop the thing off at the dump and buy my boy another on the way home, he'd never know a thing.
"Where is he?"
I had only glanced at the ball as I stood up and stretched, by the simple message instantly struck panic in me.
"Where is who?" I asked out loud, not even caring that I was talking to an inanimate object. I held my breath as the murky waters swirled again, until the inky text pressed itself up from the blackness again.
"Your son."
I panicked. I ran down the hallway, tripping and scrabbling on the door to my son's room and flung open the door. He was there, still asleep in bed. Perfectly fine, perfectly safe. I breathed out a sigh, and forced a half-smile, my boy could sleep through a thunderstorm, I'd wake him for school soon.
Walking back into my room, I grabbed a pair of my work trousers that didn't smell as bad as the others and pulled them on. I was still buttoning my shirt as I entered the corridor, skillfully holding my bag under my arm. Still a little rattled, I peaked my head into the kid's room to double check and sure enough he was still fast asleep. I'd give him 10 more minuets.

Still fiddling with my tie as I came into the kitchen, I stopped dead. I'd never been more terrified of seeing my son sat at the table making some cereal. I must've been white as winter, who the hell was upstairs? Before the kid could speak I scooped him under my arm  and bolted out the house. I've been back once since then, were transferred to another council residence, but even with the police there I was scared stiff. No amount of their investigations could ever determine who was in my son's bed, but it was always spoken in hushed undertones that I was mad. Insane. Hah! Like they could pretend they didn't see the evidence, how dare they choose to ignore the smashed and mangled toy 8-ball that we found in the bed, or the blue-ink stains slashed up the walls?

To this day I don't know what happened, and I think... I think I don't want to. I want to carry on living normally, working all week and shopping with my son at the weekend. I like this normal life, it can be hard to get by at times but raising a kid has its moments of bliss.
I think I'll pretend I don't see the other child.
Always there, always watching, slight hazy towards the corner of my vision. Yes, I'll pretend.
I'll pretend I don't see him getting closer.