We don't forget memories, not really. We just tend to let them fall from our grip. They're always there, at the back of our minds, some just out of reach.

There they thrive and dance, interspersing and evolving. A fond memory of a backyard barbeque tangos with a nature documentary, creating flying tropical burgers chasing after screaming children (in a non-traumatising way). A long lost imaginary friend crashes into a failed exam, creating an army of paper men with red pens far mightier than the ultra supreme mega rainbow sword of impending doom.

There are clouds made of chocolate mice, a purple man tranforming into a translucent sock, cartoon network versus nickelodeon battles. The Jelly-bean king sits upon his throne of eternal angst and surveys his kingdom of chaos that is slightly on fire.

The memories are different now, old friends still survive in the back of our minds. We may not remember them, but they're there, and always will be. They're just a bit preoccupied at the moment as the blueberry pies of awesomeness was recently stolen by Killer Magical Rainbow Dolphins From Mars.

Honestly, I'm not entirely sure, but if I had to guess I would say it looked a bit like this. Green grass rolling with strong wind, the faint sound of waves crashing against the cliff face provides perfect ambience. Light rain creating puddles and mud.

My friends and my family having fun, laughing and singing. The biting wind sends blue kites soaring.

Everyone is happy, but me. Because I'm on the otherside of a glass pane, they can't see me.

They can't see me as I gasp for air. The scorching sun beats down upon my back, making my skin red, peeling and blistering. Aching fists pound against the glass. They can't see me.

Their laughter taunts me, turning shrill and demonic. Instead of grass and dirt, dry sand pulls me lower and lower. Slowly sinking until I'm suffocating.

With my screams of terror, and desperate pleas for help, they finally turn to see me, but they don't move. No reassuring words, no helping hands, just their laughter ringing in my ears as I'm dragged further into the depths of the wasteland I can't escape.

It was three years ago when it happened. A wednesday morning, in July. It was only going to get warmer later in the day, songs being whispered through the radio in the waiting room as quiz shows played silently on the TV. I remember it well, I don't think I could ever forget that day. The day I learnt how far the love of a mother goes.

Belinda was absent today, in fact she hadn't shown up for work yesterday either, so I was doing the rounds instead, delivering lunch to all the patients. It was the last room on the fifth floor, a private ward. The corridor seemed to stretch on and on, the lights flickering on and off. The only sound was the squeak of the trolley's wheels, bouncing off the walls. I reached the door, finally. My hand came up to rapt three times on the door, when something stopped me.

It was the smell that hit me first. A purtid and foul odour breached my nostrils, making me gag, tears pricked my eyes. The stench of rotten eggs and festering flesh was overwhelming. My hand graced the handle, but it was the sound that stopped me this time. With my ear on the door, I could only make out faint whisperings.

'You'll be okay, oh my sweet baby boy. I won't let them take you, oh my child, what did they do to you? Don't worry mummy is here, she will never let them touch you, never ever will I let them take. Oh my sweet baby.'

The whispers were broken up by sob, and shuddering breaths. It was definently a woman crying, her wails sounded like a child dragging their nails down a chalk board.

Every instinct was telling me not to. I mean it's simple isn't it? I feel like the next victim in a horror movie, like there was an audience telling me not to go in there. To turn around. To notify security and leave it to them. But I understand what it's like to be in that situation now, your not rooted to the spot, unable to move. But rather your actions are limited. Either you move forward, or your stuck, to scared to go on.

A hand covering my nose, and the other on the handle, I push the door open.

What. The. F*ck.

The smell is ten times worse, invading every sense. Threatening to send me to my knees. But it's what I saw, that made me vomit. Upturning my stomach all over the tiled floor.

A body lay on a cot in the centre of a room, if it could even be described as a body. It had to have been dead for days. The skin wall sallow, and pale, it's arms bloated and oozing pus from stab wounds. Nails, iron nails had been hammered down into it's fingers and toes, dried blood staining the sheets brown. The stomach had be torn open, the guts spilling out onto the floor. The face is still etched into my eyelids, always there even when I close my eyes.

The head was balding, what little hair was left was greasy, the black locks slicked on the rotting skin of his scalp. The mouth was agape, the teeth were missing, the toung grey and swollen. Lips peeled back, bleach white, a frothy foam ran down one side of his mouth, trickling down his fat neck and onto the pillow. The other corner of his mouth was crusty and brown. His eyes were missing too, the nerves pulled out through the sockets.

A woman sat on the chair beside him, her mouth was bloody, she was sobbing, as she lifted one of the eyeballs and popped in her mouth, chewing the jelly like organ. It was disgusting. One of the womans fingers trailed up the patients mouth, the foaming spit coated her finger, which she then licked, before sucking the saliva of the corspe off of her hand like it was chocolate syrup. The bloodshot eyes turned to face me.

'Don't take my baby away, please.' Her voice wavered out, "he's just a baby."

The 'baby' had to be thirty years old. I backed away, there were other bodies in the room, my mind could barely comprehend Belinda's pink scrubs.

'Please, he, he, just began falling apart, so I tried to keep him together.' Her hand wandered over to the nailed fingers, and with a snap, she pulled the thumb off of the corspes hand, and a flow of pus splatterd the sheets. I retched again.

She popped the finger into her mouth. I could hear her teeth grinding against flesh.

'I'm a mother, please, I-I j-ust wanted him to be a p-part of me, forever.' Her words were punctuated with hiccups and I heard the distinct crunch of a human nail.

So I did what any sane person would do, scream my head off and run through the open door. In a flurry of security guards and many shouted profanities, the woman was detained. I remember her screaming at me, blaming me. She's insane.

That was the last I saw of her, until now. You see, I met her three years ago, her son died three years ago, she got arrested three years ago, but only eight months ago, I had a son of my own.

A beautiful baby boy, who had gone missing. I began to understand how that woman went crazy over her son's death, with my own child missing, I was reduced to a self destructive mess. I thought I would never see my baby again, and then of course, I recieved a package.

Pulling out the blood baby blanket, I slowly unbundled the little corspe, my child was ripped limb from limb, maggots eating away at his decaying form, I was losing what little I had left of him.

My shaking hand brought his head to my lip, I began to slather his scalp with my saliva, chewing away at his face. Consuming him, so he could be a part of me.

When someone says monster, everyone has a different image, that, more or less is the same. Grotesque, deformed beings, creatures of darkness with rotting skin and yellowing teeth, withering away. We all grew up with the monsters in the closet, behind the door, under the bed or in the mirror, but I think mine are a bit different.

They look like us, they blend in with the crowd, you wouldn't be able to single them out. You wouldn't know you were in danger until it was too late. Because you see, monsters act like us, they conform into society and befriend one another. Slowly but surely, corruption oozes from the cracks of their mask, infecting others, drowning them in self loathing until they too will rot away into another monster, going on to find and taint someone else.

I have many friends, but I don't trust them fully. A person is capable of truly horrendous acts, you never know what sick drama they are puperteering on the stage of their perverted mind.

Looking in the mirror, I see that I am no different. I can see myself, peeling off my flesh revealing sallow skin. Eyeballs dull and lifeless, the pupils thinning to slits. Hair oily, falling out in chunks. My nails are sharper now. My gums are bleeding, fangs jut out from my jaw. I tower over my bathroom counter and watch myself. No, I am no different. All we do is hide in our skin suits, hoping no one catches us until we catch them.

To me, that is a monster.

Glass, pretty glass gems hanging,

From grandmother's window they sparkle.

Dancing hues sent sprawling from the panes,

Light shining through,

Casting the illusion of sun and rain,

Coming together to create something new.

Not one colour, not two,

But many united, joining together to begin anew.

I always broke pencils when I was younger, there were plenty there and I used the broken halves all the time, or taped them back together, it never seemed like a big deal to me.

Then two days ago, in the midst of sleep deprivation and stress, my fingers smoothed over the cheap mechanical pencil rolling on my desk. It started with my hands slowly bending it in half, then the plastic beginning to crack. Releasing the pressure, it returned to normal, white lines spidering like webs over the once flawless blue barrel.

As quick as I could, I snapped it in half, the lead broke with the rest of the plastic casing that was supposed to act as a guard and handle for its user. Now on my desk sat the broken pencil, something that I just couldn’t put back together. First aid was required, masking tape replaced bandages, wound and wound around the broken body. The plastic was stuck feasibly together, crooked but staying together. I slotted new lead into the pencil, but it wouldn’t fit. Once something is broken, it never really works the same way again.

The plastic fell apart, the pressure too much. So it was with black ink and a heavy sigh that wrote out the words upon paper, instead of grey, friendly and familiar lead.