That Night at Grandpa's (And Other Scary Stories)

The Clown in My Basement

We kept everything we no longer needed in that musty space below the living room floor called the basement. My dad built the small stick home our family of five lived in. A tall, 1950s box TV called that dank space home as well as several other items: a burned out stainless-steel toaster, a super-sized square waffle-maker, and an old canister vacuum cleaner amongst other things. In the back corner, set a ringer washer that mom threatened could take my arm off if I did not "watch it."

I looked forward to spending time looking at one thing in the basement: a metal table laden with gadgets and gizmos strewn with yesteryears' Christmas presents now retired, or in need of repair. It provided me with hours of entertainment. Whoever invented Seek-and-Find books must have had access to such a similar table. It was a goldmine for me as a little kid.

Speaking of Christmas, it was about to be my eighth one and I wanted a punching bag. I circled as many as I could find in all of the sales ads and catalogs in the house. I pointed them out to my mother to be sure she saw all of the multi-circles and stars I had placed on those pages. The day finally arrived and I pulled a long box out from under the tree. Inside was my punching bag! My mind exploded with thoughts of the many hours I would spend roundhouse kicking and striking this bag like Bruce Lee. It was going to be a great winter break.

After inflating the new plastic-smelling object, I was surprised to find it was not even close to one of the items I had circled multiple times. How could mom have missed it? It was a clown. Red haired wings puffed out from its head. It was a little taller than I was and I took to punching its big red nose immediately. It would wobble to the floor and then arise for another punch with that same goofy smile.

I took out my frustration. I wanted the punching bag installed on the wall like my friend Jeff had, or the one on a vertical pole attached to a platform I could stand and wail on while practicing my form and bob-n-weave. Bruce was going down!

"Bruce!" That would be the clown's name. "How do you like your new name, Bruce?" I asked as I walloped the spinning toy. As its face came around, I could have sworn for just a moment its eyes were angry and below its nose, a row of jagged teeth. Eyes wide, I grabbed Bruce, turning to see what I must have only imagined.

When I was not playing with Bruce, the only place with enough space to store him was ... in the basement. If I did want to play with him, one of my brothers would get "Brucey" as they called him, for me. I was too scared to go into the basement ... alone ... to get ... the clown. It was tough being eight sometimes. Up from the basement they would lug him, peek just his face around the door frame and say, "Heeeere's Brucey!"

A few months later, my brothers started complaining about an angry-eyed, jagged-mouthed clown that kept coming into their room in the middle of the night. They would hear a thump-thump-thump like footsteps, and each brother, thinking it was the other one, would turn and look toward his door to see the night light shining on a face. What they described reminded me of my Christmas bout. I felt sick to my stomach. Should I say something?

My thoughts were interrupted by my dad who laughed full-bellied at their "overactive imaginations." It might have been their own fault for taking a magic marker and drawing jagged teeth and claws on my Brucey.

Soon after this, my two older brothers had to stay home with me while my parents went to a banquet. Despite my older brothers arguing most of the time, we had a great night together. After they put me to bed, they watched TV.

I woke up about an hour later to arguing and a strange, uncomfortable feeling in my gut. It was as if something was pushing on my chest. I could not get up and continued panting. Finally, I made my way out to the living room to tell my brothers to knock it off and be quiet. I said if they were so angry, they should just get my punching bag and hit it for a while. They looked at each other and in a flash, were gone. They must have liked the idea because they ran down the stairs leaving the spring door to slam behind them.

I turned to go to the bathroom before going back to bed. I saw something out of the corner of my eye go past the door into my bedroom. Must be one of my brothers, I thought. How did they keep the spring door from slamming? I walked out looking through the living room toward the spring door. I thought my other brother might be sneaking in to form a double team.

No one there.

I guessed that he probably made it into my bedroom before I noticed my other brother's attempt at sneaking unseen into my lair. My thoughts raced. What could I do to counter-scare my brothers? No doubt, they were ready to jump out at me. I needed a plan before I ever turned toward my room.

It was too late. Right then, something grabbed me--pulling me backward into my room. I struggled to speak but a clawed hand quickly covered my mouth. Caught off guard, the thought that it was just my older brother playing a trick on me, turned into perturbing feelings of injustice giving me enough courage to smack the hand away. I turned, faced them, and readied the speech I heard mother give those two idiots plenty of times.

It was not my brother. What emerged from the shadows caused my panting to return. My speech dropped deep within, my mouth froze open, and I choked back tears. What stepped forward into the night-light morphed before my eyes from being my brother into a winged-headed figure. It slowly move toward me revealing more and more of its shape in the light. Tears escaped my eyes as wonder and panic battled. Then it spoke.

Heeeeeere's Brucey!