Lit­tle Jimmy Camp­bell made his way up the stairs. In one hand, he held The Heroic tales of Krill the Viking – it was his favourite col­lec­tion of short sto­ries. In the other, a ragged look­ing bear hung limply. Ready for bed, he trot­ted along the hall­way and then stopped.

He didn’t want to go into his room. What lay in there was some­thing to be afraid of — the mon­ster under his bed. Of course no one believed him when he said it came out every night and scared him from sleep­ing. Poor lit­tle Jimmy was 6, and already he had dark rings around his eyes and per­pet­u­ally scruffy hair.

“Daddy, I don’t wanna—”

“Come on Lit­tle Man, there’s no ‘Grob’ or mon­ster or what­ever you call it under your bed. We’re see­ing Doc­tor Her­bert tomor­row, maybe he can help you.”

Doc­tor Her­bert? Jimmy thought. That’s the man who gives you funny lit­tle candy and lol­lipops. Why does he do that… something’s not right there. Of course he didn’t voice his cau­tion, Daddy wouldn’t take no for an answer.

Ush­ered into his room, Jimmy danced over the floor and leapt onto his bed. Slip­ping under the cov­ers, he pulled them tight before Daddy sat. “Read me the one about the BIGGER Viking, Agnar. We haven’t read that one yet!”

“Sure thing kiddo,” Daddy answered. Open­ing the book, he flicked to page 19 and began to read with as much tough­ness in his voice as he could muster. “Krill was a BIG Viking, but Agnar was BIGGER and one day…”

- — -

Jimmy was almost asleep when Daddy fin­ished the last line of the tale. “So in fac­ing his biggest foe, Agnar, Krill man­aged to save the vil­lage from a hor­ri­ble mis­take. The End!”

“Good­night Daddy,” Jimmy mut­tered, half-asleep and for­get­ful of the night to come.

“Good­night Lit­tle Man, sleep well.” Daddy kissed him on the cheek and left the room. As the door closed, and the han­dle clicked lit­tle Jimmy straight­ened sud­denly and remem­bered the mon­ster. Glanc­ing left and right, he looked for any sign but inwardly hoped that this would be different.”

“Grrrbb.”

Jimmy nar­rowed his eyes. The mon­ster was coming.

“Grrrrbobobob GROB!” A scuf­fle under the bed made lit­tle Jimmy curl up under his pil­low and close his eyes.

“GROOOOOOOOOOOB!” In the colour­ful beam of his night-light, a shadow grew big­ger on the wall. Big arms sprouted from the sides and began to bang on the walls gen­tly whilst the mon­ster whis­pered all the time, “Grob grob grob, going to keep you all night. Grob grob grob. Never going to let you sleep. GROB!

Lit­tle Jimmy, wound up in his lit­tle mind, thought over and over and over on how he could ignore the mon­ster, how he could pre­tend the Grob wasn’t there.

“GROBBLE GROBBLE!”

A shocked move­ment and Jimmy’s arm caught the edge of The Heroic tales of Krill the Viking. Paus­ing a moment, even with his eyes closed, he recalled the story of Krill and Agnar and how the hero had faced down a BIGGER bully and saved everyone.

Lit­tle Jimmy under­stood he wouldn’t be sav­ing every­one, but he was tired of no sleep and vis­its to Doc­tor Herbert’s weird smelling office.

Pulling back his cover and toss­ing aside his pil­low, BIG Jimmy grabbed his plas­tic Knight sword and raised it high. “Enough, Mr. Bad Grob Mon­ster! I’m tired, and you’re rude. I’m 6, it’s not fair and I have had enough I have. Go away!”

In the dark­ness, a light from the win­dow inter­twined with that of the night-light and a drip­ping mouth breathed heav­ily through pointy teeth. “GROB!”

“NO! Jimmy shouted. NO, NO, NO! Go away now! Go away or I’m gonna WHACK you with my sword – it’s made from SUPER-metals!” He added as an afterthought.

The mon­ster seemed to pause. “G… Grob?”

“No, bad mon­ster. No Grob­bing for you any­more. Go Grob Marty Smith at his house; he’s mean like you. He deserves it… he stole my lunch on Mon­day and—” Jimmy realised he was ram­bling. “Never mind. Are you going to go?”

The Grob snapped a final time as if it were throw­ing a tantrum and began to shrink before dis­ap­pear­ing. Jimmy smiled to him­self, but kept his place with the fake sword above his head. He had one it, he’d shown the mon­ster – the bully – who was num­ber 1 in his bed­room. He was the BOSS and no mon­ster from under anyone’s bed was going to keep him awake all night again.

Drop­ping onto his bed, Jimmy rested his Knight sword beside his bed. The door gen­tly opened and Daddy looked in. “Every­thing alright, I heard noises.”

“Every­thing is fine, Daddy. I’m going to sleep now.”