Mary cornered Sandy on the playground at recess. It wasn't as though Sandy didn't like Mary, but her friend had a habit of saying all the wrong things. Today she looked frazzled, and Sandy dreaded to hear about magic and strange creatures. She didn't need Mary's imagination to feed her problems sleeping.
"Do you still have nightmares?" Mary demanded.
"Of course not. I'm ten now, not a baby."
Mary stared at her.
"Well, just sometimes," Sandy admitted.
Mary gave a strange and decisive nod. "I thought so. We've been tracking things. I'm going to send you some help tonight. About ten minutes after you go to bed, your closet will open a bit. Don't be afraid. Monty is there to keep watch, and you'll sleep better."
Before Sandy could ask anything, the bell rang, and they went back to class. She didn't see Mary for the rest of the day.
By the time her mother tucked her in with the inevitable 'sweet dreams,' Sandy had forgotten the strange conversation.
But staying there in the near dark brought it back. Sandy chided herself for being so gullible, but she turned to watch the closet anyway.
A few minutes later, as her eyes had started to flutter shut, she heard an odd thump and whispered, 'ouch.' A soft green glow came from under the door, and it began to open.
"Eeek!"
What came out of her closet was a little green guy with a long flat snout, four fingers, two toes, and big blue eyes.
"Oh, I beg your pardon!" the two-foot-tall creature said. Tiny wings fluttered with agitation at his back. "I thought Mary told you I was going to arrive."
"She ... she did," Sandy replied and pulled her blanket up almost over her head. Her parents had the TV on, so they wouldn't hear. "But Mary says a lot of things. Most of the time, I just nod. I don't always believe her."
"Well, yes, I can see where that might happen. Mary can be so serious, even about the silliest things. Just yesterday, she told me the lights in the night sky are far away stars, not little pixies watching over the world. I don't know where she gets these ideas."
"School, I suppose," Sandy offered.
"I'm Monty," he said as he came to the edge of the bed. "And I do hope you are Sandy, or I've made a horrible mistake."
"I'm Sandy," she said with a bit of a laugh. She liked Monty.
"Nothing under the bed," he said as he looked there, and for a moment, he sounded like dad. "Nothing in the closet, either. I can vouch for that. It appears the teddy bears are doing an excellent job on the interior of the room."
"They guard here?" she said, looking at the half dozen bears sitting on shelves and the rocking chair.
"Oh yes, very good at the work. I'd say whatever is giving you nightmares is coming from outside, and my guess would be the window," Monty said. He climbed up on her desk and stared out. It had curtains, but she pulled them open at night. When they were closed, she would hear things and have worse nightmares. "I'll take up the watch here, and we'll see what happens. Go to sleep if you can."
And she did, which was unusual enough just on its own.
She woke up later at the familiar sound of something scratching at the window. The nightmare was back, and she couldn't sit up and protect herself. She flailed at the blankets --
"There they are," Monty said. "Stupid Wigglies."
She turned to see Monty on the desk. He reached out and touched the window. A glow of green spread over it, and some worm-like things retreated in haste.
"There. That's better!" Monty said with apparent satisfaction.
"Are they gone? Will you leave now? Please, don't go!"
Monty jumped from the desk to the rocking chair and from there to the edge of the bed. He glowed with just enough green light for Sandy to see him.
"I am not done here," he said with a solemn nod of his head. "They'll be back, and sometimes they bring other things. Nothing that I can't handle. I'll be here as long as you need me."
She reached out and pulled him into a tight hug. "Thank you."
"My pleasure," he said and sounded genuinely delighted. He went back to the desk.
Sandy slept through the rest of the night. In fact, she was still asleep when her mother came in to wake her. They were both surprised.
Sandy got up and pulled on her robe to go have breakfast. She crossed to the desk, giving Monty a pat on the head as a thank you.
"Where in the world did that come from?" her mother asked.
"Oh," she said and came up with a quick answer. She couldn't tell the entire truth. Sandy had already had to answer too many questions by nice doctors to go through that again. "Mary gave him to me. I -- I had him in my backpack and forgot until I did my homework."
"Well, he's an odd little thing."
"He's wonderful," she protested. "And cute. I like him."
"Nice that she gave him to you," she said absently. "Did you sleep well?"
"Better than ever."
So they went to the kitchen, both of them in a good mood. Once she was at school, Sandy hunted down Mary and quietly thanked her for Monty, who was doing an excellent job already.
Mary smiled, and after that, they were best friends -- even if Mary sometimes said strange things, like stars being pixies.
Sandy sometimes wondered if Mary and Monty might be right.
Sandy slept well after Monty arrived.
And he stayed for a long, long time...
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