The Cellar

Dipping my head through the darkened doorway into the cool air chilled from the deep cellar below, I turn and sit on the front step. I need reason to go down into the cellar or else my being there is forbidden. The cellar must be filled with trunks and casks and other amazing things but it's been out of bounds forever. I'm too old to believe anymore the story of monsters my brothers tell. I imagine ancient treasures and mysterious discoveries, cool moist airs, and the dead silence of a tomb. I'm too old to believe in mummies and I'm not very afraid of the spiders and mice. I wonder if there are bats that swoop around your head with sharp little squeaks. I wonder if I promise not to make a mess I could go down and take a look.

She says though, that whenever we go down into the basement we always leave a mess, one that she has to clean up. My brothers tell me that they once found a civil war uniform and bayonet. They said that there is a shelf of a thousand different coloured cups and jars and mugs, that there's a wardrobe filled with shelves of sprouted potatoes, and boxes and boxes of ancient mysterious tools, knives, saws, clamps, and magazines. There were thousands of magazines and mountains of newspapers they say. I think I'll die of boredom this summer.