I love horror movies. I think they are hilarious and I can’t give enough of them. They dumber they are, the better! They more alcohol, sex, and drugs they have, the better (because that means even more will die)!
However, I didn’t always use to love horror movies. As I child I was scared shitless because of them. Some of this might have to do with the fact that as five year old, my 10-, 12-, and 14-year-old cousins plus my 17-year-old uncle thought it was great to plop me down in front of the TV to watch Jason and Freddy slice and dice the public.
Anyway, I had these horrifying thoughts before I went to bed that someone was under my mattress and was going to stab me with a machete from under the bed (Friday the 13th) or that if I died in my sleep, I would surely die in real life (Nightmare on Elm Street).
I did eventually learn at the age of ten that if I laughed at these movies, my cousins and uncle would lose interest and allow me to move on to fun activities of playing football with them or tormenting my sister.
Then I hit middle school and became a fan of R.L. Stine and the Fear Street books. With my voracious appetite for books and overactive imagination, this proved a dangerous combination, as witnessed one summer day between my sixth and seventh grade years.
Julie, my BFF who I saw every day at gymnastics practice, was always over at our new house in the summer. And this particular evening, it was a Saturday, we had went to the movies, hung out at Noble Romans, and then came home. Being pre-teens we were not satisfied with going to be before midnight. So we sat chatting, playing solitaire and rum, before turning to building a house of cards.
We heard the noise as we were putting the finishing touches on the house. It was a creaking sound. A sound that sounded distinctly like footsteps down the hall to my parents’ room, my sister’s room, and my room. Well, we wrote it off as my dad going to drink from the milk carton, or my sister needing a glass of water. That is…until we heard it again ten minutes later.
It was one in the morning. And we were now paranoid beyond belief. I sprang into action like only a lithe, barely 80-pound, 12-year-old gymnast could and locked the door (Hey, this lock did keep my dad out much to his chagrin during my high school years and that even includes the time to he decided to kick my door and ended up breaking his toe). Julie and I looked at each and kept quiet, our ears trained for more sounds.
Time slowly crept by. Very slowly. We tried to resurrect the good time we were having with the house of cards, but it was in vain. Nothing could keep our attention from to the thought that robbers, that murders, that burglars might be in the house right under my family’s nose.
And then our bladders felt like they were about to burst. We held it for as long as we could, but after two in the morning, we decided we couldn’t do it and constructed a plan. I had heavy trophies from my tenure as a gymnast that stood two feet tall. We each took a trophy, laid it on the ground in front of us, and crawled on our bellies like they do in those army commercials the five feet to bathroom. Julie went and I stood guard. I went and Julie stood guard. And then we ran to my room and threw the lock.
No longer about to pee all over ourselves, we felt better. However, it was getting late, we’d had a long, all day practice and our eyelids were drooping. We neither one were comfortable going to sleep thinking prowlers might be in the house though.
We devised another plan.
The trophies were useful weapons. We decided we would hold them by the top and if we ran into a prowler, we would conk them over the head with the base of the trophy.
With our weapons and a plan, we slowly turned the lock on the door and tiptoed out into the vast darkness that was our house. We tiptoed into my parents room and checked the sliding glass door. It was locked.
Now we crept into the living room. The front door was locked, the other sliding glass door was locked, and the door into the garage was locked. So far no prowlers. We were beginning to breathe easier. However, we still had the basement left.
Our basement was the stuff nightmares were made of. It was big, it was sparse, and it had a fireplace in it that looked like a big demonic possession since the previous owners had never got around to building a hearth around it.
Julie and I neither one wanted to go down there. But a game of Rock, Paper, Scissor determined I was the unlucky soul to tiptoe into the belly of the beast.
I heaved the trophy over the shoulder, readying myself for an imminent attack and slowly, ever so slowly crept down the stairs. Halfway down the stairwell, the wall gave way and you could view the basement. I peaked my head around and saw…
THE SLIDING GLASS DOOR STANDING OPEN ABOUT FOUR INCHES!
I dropped my defensive stance, bolted across the fifteen feet to the door, shut it and locked it, then flew up stairs leaving Julie in my wake screaming for my parents!
Despite the open basement door, there was no one in the house, no massacred siblings, and nothing missing. My mom and dad were not concerned with the basement door left open overnight, but to appease the two chickens, they went through the basement to prove to us no one was in the house. It didn’t matter. We were scared shitless. My mom slept in the room with us that night.
And right as we were about to doze we heard the noise again.
“Is that it?” my mom asked.
“Yes,” Julie and I said in unison.
“It’s air conditioner kicking on,” she said and rolled over onto her side.
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