Marge’s house was a brownish Tan colored single floored abode with a long planked ramp that switched back on itself in order to reach the raised front door. It sat back about an acre in the front yard, with a few small trees placed around the grass. Maybe it was my childhood imagination… but to me, it seemed like every window to the place was tinted black, adding to the haunted atmosphere this place radiated. It was the sort of place you would never want to go, and if you found yourself there, people driving by would never give it a second thought. A perfectly kept camouflage to the outside world. The backyard offered little in the way of solace as well. A screened in back porch was well equipped with outdoor furniture, and its plastic cushions. It had a nice view of a pond way in the back of the yard… where everyone was forbidden to go. I remember bits of scenes from a day there left with the babysitter. Everything always seemed so strange and foreign, and I remember being terrified of having to go there, for what always seemed like forever. Walking up that ramp to the door, felt like walking straight through the gates of some sort of hell… only that there was no fire… just strangeness all around. The inside of the place kept with the theme. It was pretty cluttered. There was a dining room with gray carpet and plenty of books, appliances, clothing, whatever, all stacked up high. Judging by the chandelier that never once turned on, I did not even have to be told that it was a room no one used or crossed through. The main thoroughfare was the kitchen/living room. On a brown leather couch is where you could find Marge, or sometimes her husband, who didn’t speak to the children. They had a tiny little box tv they somehow propped up high in a corner, and they watched fuzzy repeats of “The Price is Right” nonstop. The floor throughout was a sticky brown linoleum, and they kept two dog dishes right next to the sliding door to the back deck, although I don’t ever recall seeing a dog. And then there was the smell of the place. . . It’s hard to describe. It was a thick general odor, not of burnt food, but of some sort of concoction stemming from the kitchen area. It took up the entire house and punched your nostrils right as you walked through the door. It took some getting used to for sure, and often made me feel disoriented and queazy. Perhaps that was Marge’s ultimate secret: a vapor that subdued children so she could go on watching her gameshow. . . Marge was a big woman. Trust me, that is an understatement. Marge wore faded blouses that sort of draped over her like a bullfrog in a bedsheet. Sometimes you could even see her doughy midsection protruding from the bottom of the blouse, while she sat on her couch. She was also a smoker. I mean she was going for broke chain smoking. This of course attributed to her signature phlegmy cough. But yet somehow, all that smoke never helped to mask the odor of the house… you can imagine I wanted to hang out on the back porch more than anywhere else in the place. On this particular occasion it was rainy. It had been one of those long spells of cloudy rain. Sometimes it would sprinkle, sometimes it would pour. Just enough to saturate the earth and make it impossible to play games outside. I had still spent most of the time bored out of my skull, lying on one of the pieces of furniture in the backyard. I had attempted to nap my way through today’s jail sentence, but to no avail. I bit my lip and decided the only option for entertainment at this point was to go inside, sit near Marge, and quietly watch ‘The Price is Right’. If anything, it was a change of scene from watching the rain hit the pond way out back. I opened the sliding door, and was greeted with a blast of house smell, and Marge hacking up a lung. “Can… I watch TV with you?” I asked shyly. Marge simply patted the couch next to her, inviting me to sit down. I did so, and then she stamped out her cigarette and in rare fashion, folded her arms around her midsection instead of reaching for another smoke. After a little bit of fidgeting and swinging my legs patiently, I finally blurted out. “I’m bored.” Marge rolled her head over in my direction and stared directly into the pit of my soul with her dead eyes. “Your parents will be here in three hours. Just sit here until then.” She instructed. “But…” SLAP! It shocked me. Not just getting slapped, she didn’t slap me too hard. I had been slapped by neighborhood kids twice as hard just fooling around. But when I felt her leathery skin, the effect was like chomping down on a AA battery. It stung in a very strange and toxic way. It would have been enough to make a grown man start puking his guts out, but I contained myself, let my eyes fill up with tears and then left the couch. “Pssst.” Came a whisper. “Psssst!!” I got on all fours and crawled into the dining room. I didn’t want Marge to catch a glimpse of me entering. The sound was coming from one of the furnace vents. I crawled up to it and whispered into it. “Hello?” Suddenly the face of another kid appeared inside the vent! He was covered from head to toe in black soot. “Psst. Kid…” He warned. “You don’t want to upset Marge.” “Why?” I asked. Then my mind started flooding with curiosity and questions. “What are you doing down there? How did you get in the vent?” “I climbed up it. . . After she threw me in the furnace.” The kid said. “She what!?” “She threw me in the furnace because I made her mad!” The kid explained. “When you get her mad, she burns you alive to heat the house!” “What did you do to upset her?” I asked. “You know that pond out back? The one no one is allowed to see? … Well a few of us were over here and we all decided to break the rule and walk back there. She chased after us on the lawnmower!” “Really?” “I swear! And she scooped us up one by one and dragged us back into the house. Then she tossed us one by one right into a large furnace! I managed to climb up it before she turned it on. . . The other kids were not as lucky.” “Oh my god.” I said, shivering at the thought of being burned alive to heat a house. “What should I do?” “I’d do exactly what she says from now on.” The kid warned. “Or you’ll end up down here like me!” “I have to tell someone! I have to get you out of there!” I thought out loud. “The only way anyone is going to believe you is if you visit the furnace, find the bones of the other children and take that away from the house to show to someone. Marge has got a hold on people… if you try to tell someone while you are here, they won’t believe you!” “How do you know all this?” I asked. “Because I have been forced to come here for about 3 years. And the day I was thrown in here, my parents showed up. Marge greeted them at the door, told them something and then they just walked away and drove off, not even acting sad. She put them under some sort of spell! I’m telling you! She will do the same with your parents if you are not careful!” “Okay.” I said, mustering all the bravery I had ever had. “I have to try. I have to try to help you.” “There’s just one problem.” The kid said. “Whats that?” “The door to the furnace room is through the living room where Marge always is. If you want to get in there, you will need a distraction to get her to move.” “I’ll figure something out. Just hang on, I’ll get us both out of here.” I assured the kid. I crawled away from the vent and then positioned myself underneath of the Dining room table, where I could just make out Marge sitting with a trail of smoke rising through the air. I tried to think of a good plan to unstick Marge. Then I remembered… she had something boiling in the kitchen. If it somehow got knocked to the ground, she would have to go clean it up. I located a ball of blue yarn among the dining room clutter. Then I made my approach. I continued to crawl slowly on my hands and knees, keeping a firm eye on Marge the entire time. I slipped to the side of the couch, and she seemed oblivious. Then I crawled across the linoleum. I peeled my hands off the sticky surface with every step. A moment later, heart racing, I was directly underneath the stove. I could hear a thick churning of bubbling liquid from a large stainless steel pot above me. It had a handle on either end of the top, and one of the handles was hanging just over the countertop. I unraveled some of the string and reached up with both hands, tying a knot around the handle. Then I decided I needed to get a little distance, so Marge wouldn’t catch me so quickly. If she caught me in the act, I reckoned I would be firewood before the day was over. I left a trail of yarn with me as I crawled my way back to the dining room. The trap was set. I pulled the yarn. . . The chaos that ensued was expected, but it all happened within the matter of a minute. There was a loud crash, sickly looking liquid spread all across the kitchen floor, and Marge let out a loud curse and came running to check what had happened. I wasted no time, scrambling right past her while her back was turned. I grabbed the handle to the door across the living room and flung it open so hard that it banged against the wall with a loud thud. This unfortionitly alerted Marge to my presence. She whipped around and I caught a split second look of her twisted red face of pure anger right before I threw myself inside the furnace room and slammed the door behind me, putting a door between Marge and myself. Quick to think I grabbed a chair and propped it up against the door so it would not open. The handle started turning furiously and Marge could be heard screaming at me from the other side. I turned my attention to the furnace and opened the little doorway where one would put in Wood to burn. The door opened and the horrifying site of little bones strewn about ash made me instantly step back. Then the door burst open, and Marge had me within her grasp. “Now you’ve done it!” She screamed as she pushed me forward into the furnace and shut the little door. The darkness around me became dense. It wouldn’t be long before the shadows of the other children overtook me completely. Then I woke up suddenly. I was back in the car with my parents, pulling out of Marge’s driveway. “What happened!?” I asked suddenly. “We came to get you and Marge said you were sleeping on the couch sweetie,” my mother said. “So she scooped you up and put you in the car for us. Nice lady.” I looked down, unconvinced of the explanation… There was black soot on my shoes. . . And dread within.