On the first day of grade school, David’s only son Robbie came home to tell him about how his new homeroom teacher, Mr. Percy, had children’s faces on his back. David had to shut the lid of his laptop to look at Robbie properly. His son held out a crayon drawing for him to see.

“There were three kids on his back, Dad. They all look very sad. I tried asking my friends if they saw the three, but everyone said no.”

To be honest, what Robbie said didn’t shock David much. Ever since he could talk, Robbie had described the people he saw peculiarly. The moment he could form four-word sentences, Robbie began babbling about how his aunt had no neck whenever she came to see him. It disturbed his aunt greatly, yet she would always tell David how Robbie has second sight with an awestruck expression, fingers ghosting on the skin of her neck where her ex husband sometimes choked her in the heat of arguments. At around three years old, Robbie told David his chest was on fire. David dismissed his son’s worries as he blew out a billow of smoke. Children didn’t know what smoking was, so Robbie must have automatically attributed the smoke to flames.

Robbies’ stories became more and more bizarre as the years went by, so much so that David no longer even bat an eyelid when he heard them. Whenever his wife Margaret led Robbie outside to play at the park, she’d recount to him how Robbie would point at passersby and prattle on and on about how weird they looked. A lady whose crotch was a locked chest. A businessman whose head spun and spun in circles. And an old grandma with half of her head missing.

He would be lying if he said he wasn’t unsettled, but David dismissed everything as Robbie’s childish imagination. Children his age had imaginary friends and a wild mind, so these were no real sources of concern.

That was until he took a closer look at the drawing Robbie gave him.

(Image link: https://imgur.com/xiySvze - also in the description)

David stared long and hard at the drawing. It was disturbing, to say the least, seeing three crying children’s faces sprout from a grown man’s back.

“During break, I tried to ask him about it, but Mr. Percy looked at me weirdly. I don’t think he likes me very much.”

Of course he wouldn’t, David thought. If someone asked him why he had crying children faces on his back, he would be weirded out as heck too.

“He was very sad when I described the three kids to him, though. He said they were identical to his three children, who died years before in an accident. I hope he won’t hate me for making him sad. Mr. Percy is nice. He gave us candy.” Robbie added quietly with a sullen expression.

David ruffled his son’s hair to console him, telling him to be careful and not say these things to Mr. Percy anymore if he wanted to make Mr. Percy happy. Still, he pocketed Robbie’s doodle to show his wife Margaret later. Margaret, who took Robbie to class that day, had a puzzled look on her face as David repeated Robbie’s words.

“Mr. Percy’s single.”

**********

A week after, the moment David came home from work, he could tell Robbie was visibly upset. He was much more quiet than usual, and when David sat down to ask him what was wrong, he didn’t say anything at first.

“... I tried talking to the three children today.”

David frowned. “What do you mean?”

“I tried talking to the three children!” Robbie’s voice rose a few octaves. “They always looked so sad! No one could see them, so I don’t know what to do. I don’t want my friends to think I’m talking to myself! So I wrote on a piece of paper and held it up when Mr. Percy turned his back to me to write on the board. I just wanted to ask them why they always cry so much!”

Robbie was close to tears at this point. “Th-they told me they wanted to go home. They said Mr. Percy hurt them. I don’t understand, isn’t Mr. Percy their father?”

Dave pulled Robbie into a hug and rubbed circles on his back, then told him some jokes to make him forget the whole thing. Luckily, Robbie was a carefree child, and it only took him ten minutes to wipe his runny nose and patter towards the telly.

David spent the whole evening researching information on Robbie’s homeroom teacher. He wasn’t sure what he was expecting to find. Of course nothing much came up, just his Facebook profile and a few other social network accounts. He even questioned his wife about what little she knew of Mr. Percy. He seemed perfectly inconspicuous, a degree here, a degree there, just another straight-laced teacher straight out of training.

Why, then, did Robbie’s stories unnerve him so much?

David reached across the table to grab the ashtray, taking in another lungful of smoke and mulling over his thoughts, just as Robbie went into the living room to retrieve his teddy.

“Dad, your lungs are dripping tar again.”

David sighed heavily, put out his half-lit cigarette in the nearby glass ashtray, and followed his son to his bedroom to tuck him in.

**********

Four days after this incident, Robbie excitedly bounced into the kitchen for his usual breakfast, backpack slung from his small shoulders. David lowered the newspaper and smiled at his son. The newspaper was flipped halfway, as David didn’t have the habit of reading the newspaper from front to back. He just picked out the sections that intrigued him, and the rest of important world news he could always trust news site and the telly to sum up for him.

Margaret sat Robbie down across from David and passed him a plate with peanut butter and jelly sandwich squares. David went back to his newspapers, skimming through the finance announcements to read the sports section, and he was so enthralled in the recent doping scandal from his favorite football team that he didn’t register what Robbie said at first.

“Why is Mr. Percy on the newspaper?

David looked up in slight confusion, seeing Robbie’s small hands pointing excitedly at the front of the newspaper. “And the three children are there too!”

David never knew how this Percy bloke looked like, but his wife, who often took Robbie to class, confirmed Robbie’s words with a gasp. “By golly, it really is Mr. Percy! What’s he doing in the local headlines?”

A bespectacled man with skin the color of sour cream and short hair parted in the middle stared back at David from the front cover. Below his picture were pictures of three children, all around the ages of nine and ten. Their pallid faces and downcast gazes gave David the chills.

“What’s that long word next to Mr Percy means, Dad? P-e-...”

David hastily yanked the newspaper away from Robbie’s view. Margaret quickly covered Robbie’s eyes and led him out of the room, explaining to him with a shaky voice how the article was not for children. David could hear Robbie’s protests as Margaret directed him towards the front door.

**********

Three days later, Robbie’s class had a new homeroom teacher.