News & Features » October 2017 » “Spawn of Satan” by Victoria Madison

“Spawn of Satan” by Victoria Madison

Are you a parent going through the Terrible Twos? Did you live through them and survive? Terrible Twosdays is a place to commiserate over the unending shenanigans of your Darling Children (as the online parenting communities say). Nonfiction stories will be considered, so long as names have been changed to protect the guilty. Inspired by our best-selling gift book for parents, Go the Fuck to Sleep, Terrible Twosdays joins the roster of our other online short fiction series. Unlike Mondays Are Murder and Thursdaze, we’re looking for stories with a light and mischievous feel, all about the day-to-day challenges of parenting. As with our other flash fiction series, stories must not exceed 750 words.

At the end of your rope you buy a harness. Two, actually. Sometimes you just gotta.

Spawn of Satan
by Victoria Madison
Two year old twins

When my twins were two years old I had steamy droplets of perspiration dripping out of every pore in my body. The inferno of a custody battle that I was smack dab in the middle of was blazing around me. I tried to sleep on the bed of coals but most nights found that futile. There was no sleep for a single twin Mama strategizing about how to save her babies from the beast who donated his ejaculatory fluid and piss poor DNA to assist in their creation.

At the heart of the custody warfare were my offspring. They were left to be wild in my company. Two year olds are enthusiastic as it is. These two year olds had free reign of their home, their surroundings, their little lives, and my life. That was until Satan himself showed up and decided that after checking out for months that it was time for him to check back in and try to regain some control over his life, his children, and of course, me. This man has an innate need for power but always chooses women who are way more dominate and educated than he ever could be. He takes their degradation until he gets to the point of explosion. When he erupts he spews fire and hate on anyone in his path.

During this time, the Spawn of Satan took every opportunity they could find to run. They ran in separate directions and they were quick about it too. The first time it happened I was in a state of shock. We were standing outside of their day care which was located in a six-story office building. Surrounding the building was a large, high-traffic parking lot. Their day care was on the fifth floor. So, on this particular morning Spawn A took off running around the side of the building. As a knee jerk reaction I took after her to corral her back to our morning path. When I retrieved her and returned to the front of the building, Spawn B was no longer there. I looked around and a friendly package delivery driver told me that he had gotten onto the elevator. I panicked and ran to the elevator. Although the door had closed he had not pushed any buttons so he stayed on the ground floor.

After this day I devised my plan to secure the closest child first and run after the second child next. This worked for us but the day care workers were not included in this strategy. I figured they had a system to keep the group of tykes from running. It turns out that their system was a rope with loops that each child was supposed to hold onto as they walked around the building and across the parking lot to the playground. Apparently Spawn A and Spawn B saw this as an opportunity to try out their new running shoes, leaving their bright-eyed, young, and underpaid teachers in a state of shock. The teachers somehow managed to corral them but I have no clue how. They reported the incident to me and all I could do was laugh. It wasn’t the response they were expecting. I tried to hold it back—I really did—but I couldn’t believe that they expected a class of two year olds to hold onto the rope, and not have a backup plan if they made a break for it.

The running and chasing was a game they knew I would always play. My final attempt at keeping tabs on them without a leash backpack left me in tears. I took them to a jazz festival with some friends at a local college. All three of us spent the entire time chasing the kids in opposite directions until I had enough. I strapped the wiggly ones into their double stroller and started walking towards my car. As I walked tears began to fall. I couldn’t go anywhere and enjoy it unless these two were harnessed down in their stroller which often made them cry.

After this day I broke down and did what I never believed I would do: I bought the harness backpacks. They didn’t like it at first, but they adjusted. It was better than being in a stroller. I noticed the glares and stares but all the while I felt the much needed sense of peace.

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VICTORIA MADISON is a writer who lives with her treasured children in Pennsylvania. She finds the world of fiction to be a liberating escape from her true passion which is nonfiction writing. Victoria has endeavored over twenty different occupations to cultivate her awareness of her surroundings and to enhance her perspective of the world and its inhabitants.

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Do you have a story you’d like us to consider for online publication in the Terrible Twosdays flash fiction series? Here are the submission terms and guidelines:

—We are not offering payment, and are asking for first digital rights. The rights to the story revert to the author immediately upon publication.
—Your story should focus on the challenges of parenting. Ideally, stories should be about children aged 0 to 5, but any age (up to early teens) is acceptable. Stories may be fiction or nonfiction.
—Include the child’s age at the time of the story next to your byline.
—Your story should not exceed 750 words.
—E-mail your submission to info@akashicbooks.com. Please paste the story into the body of the email, and also attach it as a PDF file.

Posted: Oct 3, 2017

Category: Original Fiction, Terrible Twosdays | Tags: flash fiction, motherhood, single mom, Spawn of Satan, Terrible Twosdays, The Terrible Twos, twins, two year old, Victoria Madison