Sophie opened the door to the basement, as

Sophie opened the door to the basement, as memories of dozens of horror movies flickered through her thoughts. Should she go down and look for it? Or should she give up now?

The thing was, though, that Sophie NEEDED the vacuum cleaner and for some reason, Hal had stored it down there in the cold, dark, terrifying basement. A pale green light

as it wiggled about a like a cobra doing a hypnotising dance. She tried to touch it but everytime she put her hand out it vaporised into thin air. She started to feel dizzy

from drinking all those beers and spinning around with her forehead on the bat as a pivot. She'd puked on first base. Christ, where is Pat? They were supposed to makeout in the dug

out. Grrr. Now she'd never get her special kiss. Though this was pretty far away from a fairy tale. There was a lot mroe drunkenness and bad splelling than the grims woulod allouw.

She look around suspiciousally. That fat grey "unicorn" was looking more and moore like a rhinocerous. And was Sleepy relly sleeping, or did he pass owt? Something was amuck.

I scratched my bum as I figured no one was looking. I figured, every time I think no one's there, they come out at the most inconvenient times. But this time, there was no one.

My last modicum of decency died that day. Burping was my dialect. I stopped deleting my browser history. There was no stopping my plunge until I saw my mother at the door. Rinse,

lather, scream. My mother had died when I was twelve. So what was this? Had she returned to tell me to clean up my room, my house, my life? Without a word, without a hug, she left.