The Three Little Children

''We are the little children- come and play! If you don't, you'll have to stay!'' -Based off the Filipino myth of the Chanak-

I still remember a horrible memory in the woods, of three small shadows. I was lucky enough to recall the "myth".

There was once a young girl, who's mother never gave her a name. In fact, the girl never knew her mother, who left, and her father was always at work. For some reason, on every full moon, her mother would try looking for her, but failed. The mother, of course, was a Manamangal. This creature is hard to keep track of, sadly, but few were able to witness it alive. It's always a woman, but on every full moon, when pregnant women go to sleep, she creeps in their windows. I've been able to recognize it from its tounge, extremely long with two sharp teeth at the end. She splits mothers' stomachs with the teeth, and feasts on the baby. This woman retired from her brutal career, and instead went looking for her child. She once ate two unusually tasty babies, and their ghosts somehow remained. Oh, but, she didn't search for her daughter just to find her. Her plan was to slit her stomach from the belly button, and eat her insides, and then eat the rest of her. The father never knew of this, so he remained at work.

After months, the mother, or monster, found her child, lying and sleeping on the floor. Just as she planned, she ate her the way she wanted to. It was quite a feast, but she left a little blood on a cloth. The child's soul grew into a shadow as her mother leapt and flew out the window. Her shadow joined the others, and together they ate the bloody cloth.

To this day, I have no idea where the little children are, but every full moon their shadows are in the woods. When I went to a festival, I saw them, singing a little tune. "It was my mother who murdered me, it was my father who ate me, it was my Sister Marjory, who all my bones she found; in a handkerchief she bound, and lay them under the almond tree. Kywitt, kywitt, kywitt, I cry, Oh what a beautiful bird am I!"

Look, this is my first not so scary story. Constructive criticism please!