-4-

Hunger had brought him back. The fact that it was dark and cold outside only made it worse. He had been kneeling at the edge of the trap door that led down into the cellar for the last fifteen minutes and still hadn’t worked up the nerve to venture in there without a light. (bright white light?) Something about that place frightened him, put him on edge. He had never been a superstitious man, but if he sat there any longer he might become one.

I can’t believe your afraid of the dark, his brain said.

Can’t you feel it?! His heart snapped. There is something down there.

Children are afraid of the dark, what are you, a little boy?

Haven’t you ever seen any movies?! His heart shot back. THIS is the part where the creepy music starts playing, the part where you start screaming at the TV, telling the moron on it to get the heck away from that dark room, and you plead with him to please see the giant man with the chain saw hiding behind the door! I see the chainsaw, in fact I can hear it running from here; I am NOT going down there!

You went down there before, nothing bad happened.

So the guy with the chainsaw dozed off for five minutes and missed us, what’s your point?!

I though my point was rather obvious. NOTHING. BAD. HAPPENED. Does that help? You’ve just got a bad case of the creeps.

Can’t you just wait till morning? His heart pleaded.

Once again, you're just afraid of the dark. There is nothing bad down there, and no boogie man is going to jump out and get you. Just ease your way down the ladder, grope around on the shelf, grab a few cans of Girt (Spam) and you can get out of here.

...

Come on, this is foolish, you’re a grown man.

There was something else though. He could hear that voice, still whispering. It was almost like someone mumbling in their sleep. The words echoed in the cellar, unnaturally.

There was nothing for it; either go down there, or starve, he told himself. He grimaced, gripped the rungs of the old ladder, and made his way down.