I once hated the dark,
Because it was not my friend.

We never spoke, and everywhere I went, the light followed me.
Just my candlelit lantern and I.
We were friends.

One day, the light did not go on, nor could I find my matches or a spare.
As I searched, I had also lost with it my favorite of rings.

"I can help." The dark spoke.

"No, thank you." I replied, hiding my fear with bitterness.

"Please, you might hurt yourself."

"I said no!"

Going about angrily, I stumbled and cursed, turned this way and that, stumbled and hit myself into a plethora of things and ended up tripping down the stairs straight onto my bottom.

-at the bottom of the dark and cold.

I hated the dark you see, because it reminded me of the former things.
The lost things.

It reminded me of evil and sadness, of misfortune and all fears and scary things.
It reminded me of my mother who passed and my father who is gravely ill,
It reminded me of being lost without a hand,
Of pain and loneliness.
It reminded me of the nightmares I had and the face in whom caused them.

I cried.
I had never cried.
But despite all my pride, I cried for the first time.

Suddenly a voice came from the silence.
"I never was one to cause such misery, I am the dark yes, but even in the dark can there be good things.
Your mother, don't you remember the night sky you both enjoyed? The campfires and the late nights you spent with her talking and laughing? The fireflies and the warmth of the fireplace as you sat and even went to sleep looking up at your glow-in-the-dark stars?
Then in the dark, you would sit and wait for the goodnight kiss and smile given to you and wake up the next, your father there and alive still. The dark reminding you that there is a new day of light and hope.
The time where you realize that you made it passed that one night, and that you are stronger than before.
You and your friends stay up late, doing this and that. Don't you remember them?
Without me, you would have not remembered even the times you had when you weren't afraid, but brave.
Come..."

Wiping my eyes I got up and walked back up the steps, back to my room where the voice spoke again.

"Look, underneath there."

My bed stood desolate and cold.

"But I don't like it under there."

There was silence but I didn't want to hesitate no more in it.
With a large sigh I knelt down and looked underneath.

Piles of random things as well as dust, but there I had found them- a spare box of matches and my ring on top.

"Thank you."

"The next time you are afraid, remember who you are and all the smallest things. Without the bad, we cannot appreciate the good. Without the dark, we cannot appreciate the light."

That night, I slept without my latern.
I never hated or feared the dark again.
That night, I slept soundly,
The darkness a comfort.