I lay in bed, shivering at the sombre texture of this night’s air. The stars didn’t seem to shine. They burned like the lamp that always stood on my bedside table. The stars that used to have so much contrast against the night sky now lay with it as one, as if resting on a dark black hammock. They seemed so at peace but somehow made me restless. My feet realized they were nearly frozen and I couldn’t move them at all. I heard a loud sigh coming from the other room. I waited a few seconds until hearing Father’s rusty voice, as if he had been awake for a long time again.
“It won’t do!” rasped his voice, “What is missing?”
He was working on his book again. I crept along the floorboards, stepping only on the ones I was sure wouldn’t creak. I had marked the silent floorboards with chalk, so that I could move around my room without making any noise. Father hated noise. I somehow mustered up enough courage to peek around the door. He was sitting on his armchair, brows knitting together furiously; mouth crooked holding a cigarette that had been lit for a while. The typewriter he had gotten many years ago laid in front of him, and he glared at it as if it was a monstrous beast he had to face down.
He loathed the typewriter, a loathing that could not be explained by Mother, me, or even Father. Even though he had such intense hatred towards it, he could never get rid of it. It was some form of a sick obsession. Many nights he did not sleep at all, typing and typing on the wretched thing, claiming to be writing a book. I tried to see what book he was writing many times, but he just told me to “bugger off”. The typewriter was very different to me. It was absolutely frightening, and I could not explain this fear either. I had a deep fear of typewriters, and did not understand how anyone could be afraid of such silly things as snakes and ghosts when typewriters continued being in existence. For some strange reason, my feet stepped forward towards him, ignoring the chalk, and making the floorboards whine.
“Loretta!” he exclaimed, clearly surprised to see me out of bed, “What are you doing up so late?”
“Father, I just thought you might need some help. On your story.” I responded, trying not to make any eye contact with him. He became quite red in the face and shook his head slowly.
“No way I’m letting you stay up. Off to bed you go. Now.” I hung my head to this but I knew better than to go against Father. I walked back to bed, using the chalk this time.
The next day I woke up very early and decided that if Father wouldn’t let me read his book, I would have to find a way to read it myself. He was asleep, which was quite extraordinary, so I crept into the living room to look for the written pages. Surprisingly enough, I didn’t find any at all, except the crumpled papers in the bin, so I decided to look in there. I reached into it with my entire arm, trying to get the first pages of the story. I chose one that seemed particularly old and unfolded it. I read:

The name of my daughter will be Loretta.
Loretta will have red hair and green eyes.
Loretta will be quiet.
Loretta will have no need for toys.
Loretta will never cry.
Loretta will always be eleven years old.

I sputtered for a bit, unable to form an actual sentence. All of those things were true. I reached into the bin, pulling out many more crumpled papers. Loretta will be shy. Loretta will not go out. Loretta will be intelligent. My heart rushed around my chest and my head started to pound. What was going on? This wasn’t a book. I read over the sentences. Loretta WILL be, Loretta WILL be, Loretta WILL be. He didn’t know it for sure. He had guessed all those things, and all of them were the truth! I reached into the bin once more to the paper that seemed to be the oldest.
Ruth is a blonde woman with green eyes.
I will be married to Ruth.
Ruth will do as I say.

Ruth was my mother, and so I didn’t understand why he would state such things about her. I was very scared, but I too curious to let this go. I sat at the wooden stool and pointed my index finger, and I started to slowly typing a sentence on the typewriter.
“Lo…re…tta… had… a… dog…” I muttered under my breath. As soon as I finished, a large cloud of smoke gathered in the corner of the living room. A dog-like figure appeared, and its features slowly became more detailed and defined. I gasped loudly as I backed up into the table. The dog barked loudly and ran towards me. I held my index finger to my lips, trying to get him to be quiet. After all, Father hated noise.
The dog obviously didn’t understand why I was motioning so he continued to bark and whine. I grabbed the dog and shoved him underneath the couch, but he scrambled out and ran towards the corner. I heard Father cursing loudly in the other room. He limped into the living room.
“Did I just hear a dog?!” he looked at the mutt in the corner, now quiet and bowing his head, “When did you get a dog?!”
“Father. Your typewriter, I wrote on it, and it… he just… he happened!” Father’s eyes rang with recollection and looked at the typewriter. He sighed loudly and sat down in the couch, motioning to the seat next to him.
“Loretta. You may think I’ve gone crazy when I tell you this, but there’s no other way I can tell you this. You were never born, and neither was your mother.” I gave an involuntary twitch to that, but said nothing, “One day, many years before your mother’s existence, even more before your existence, I bought this typewriter from the flea market. I brought it home with me, and started to write. I wrote only about only what I wanted in my life, a bucket list if you will. And one by one, all of these things came into existence. Just like your mutt.”
“Wha… I, I don’t understand. I just came from a wisp of smoke? I just came from ink on a page?”
“Yep.” His general, monosyllabic response annoyed me.
“Prove it, then, Father, prove that I came just from keys on a typewriter.” He sighed loudly.
“There’s no way to prove that. You didn’t really come with a ready birth certificate.” Though he remained as calm as I had ever seen him be, rage bubbled inside of me and I had to spit it out.
“Father, you are insane! You know deep down inside of you that you are lying, don’t you? Don’t you?!” I yelled. Father suddenly was no longer calm. He had always been easily angered, and his own daughter yelling at him was something he could not let go. His face was so read it was difficult not to imagine steam pouring out of his ears like in the Sunday cartoons.
“All right, Loretta, then tell me a time where you were not eleven years old. Please, enlighten me.” I thought for a long time and became so frustrated, so angry I was almost convincing myself that he spoke the truth that I pulled my arm back and slapped him hard on the cheek. He held his cheek with his right hand, glaring at me, as if he were incredulous that I even had enough strength to hold my own arms up. But Father was an angry man, and he would never allow this. I might as well have tried to kill him, his response would be the same. He didn’t care about how bad the act was, if it was against him, heads would roll.
“Ruth!” he called. At first, I thought he would tell her what I had done, but it seemed too nice of Father. He took out the paper in which “Ruth is a blonde woman with green eyes” was written and said, “You want your proof, Loretta? You’ll get it.” Mother came from the kitchen and said, “Yes, honey? What is it?” Father only muttered “goodbye” under his breath and ripped the paper in half.
Mother soon began to dissolve into the air. Smoke swirled around her, removing small pieces of her, but she did not seem to be in pain. I tried to reach out and touch her, not believing what was happening in front of my eyes. After a few seconds, Mother was gone forever. I turned my head towards Father.
“How could you? You loved her. You were married!”
“She was just part of my imagination. And so are you. I am going crazy. You are not real. You simply are not.” He said these things as if they were directed towards me, but I knew he was just reassuring himself that they were true. “And,” he said, “to prove it, I will do the same to you. Because nothing happens to those that do not exist.”
“Father. Father, don’t do this. You love me, right? I’m not just another fantasy of yours, I am your daughter! I’m going to call an ambulance, all right?”
But Father had already found the paper that had created me, and held his two hands at the top, about to rip it.
“Goodbye,” he muttered, and I heard the loud crack of ripping paper. Smoke began to surround me, nibbling at my arms and legs, taking away pieces of skin, of hair, of flesh. It didn’t hurt at all, and I felt like I was already dead. At least when I was dead I was silent. After all, Father hated noise.