She Was Hidden

Bethany had the covers pulled up over her head.

She was hidden.

She was scared of the monsters under her bed, or in particular, the loudest monster under her bed. That monster was the scariest; it made rasping sound while she tried to sleep. That’s when Bethany pretended she was in her princess castle, the castle that was in her head. If it was in her head she could take it with her wherever she went.

That’s why she liked the name Bethany, it sounded like a princess name. Many people had tried to call her ‘Beth’, but she would have none of it. Bethany always wanted to be a princess, she liked their dresses and their castles. She was young; she didn’t understand that your parents had to be royalty to be a princess. Her life dream was to grow up and be a princess.

She was almost away in her castle, when the largest monster under her bed made the rasping sound. This was soon followed by some of the smaller monsters making quiet gurgling sounds, but Bethany wasn’t worried about them. She quivered in fright and pulled the covers tighter around her.

She had a lot of trouble falling asleep that night.

~*~*

Betty was squatted in the closet in the guest bedroom.

She was hidden.

Betty had grown up a lot since she got people to call her ‘Bethany’. It was too long, and the name ‘Beth’ was too common. So she got people to call her Betty, none of the girls at school were called Betty. She heard her cousin counting downstairs, he was nearing at 50. She had found this hiding spot quickly, it was her house the family reunion was being held at, and so she knew all the good hiding spots.

She giggled in excitement as she heard her cousin shout,

“Ready or not, here I come!” His voice echoing through the house. Betty was one of the oldest kids playing the giant game of hide-and-seek. She was eight now, people were starting to say she was getting too old for games. Betty had been rather shocked to find there was a time in a person’s when it became ‘juvenile’ to play hide-and-seek.

No one would find her for a while, she was sure of it. It was the first time most of her family had been to her new house, she would know it better than all the other kids. Betty had moved out of her old house with the ‘monsters’. She had long outgrown the monsters-under-my-bed stage; she was eight, practically a grown woman.

Betty was the last one to be found that day, the other kids had to call out and beg for her to show herself.

~*~*

Betty was sitting on the closet toilet seat lid of the end cubicle.

She was hidden.

Her feet were tucked up on the toilet seat with her, so no one could see her torn up converse under the door. She was hidden from everyone outside the cubicle, how she wanted it. Though she was on her phone, scrolling through Instagram, so she wasn’t completely hidden from those outside the cubicle. She was on her own, so she had pushed the long sleeves of her shirt up, so that the thin pink lines marking both wrists were visible as she scrolled through photos.

Every so often her phone would buzz, and a Facebook banner would show up on the top of her screen. She could see the first seven or so words of each post, mostly consisting of rude names. She looked around the walls of the cubicle, she always came here, and she felt safe here. Here and home, well most of home, not her room though. She didn’t feel safe in her room. That was where computer was, where her phone charged, that was where all the messages were red.