It was just another boring day delivering pizzas. I hated work but I needed to make money to pay for my car. I was delivering to 1710 Highland Road, a place I had never been to before. There were so many trees that when I saw the mailbox with the right number, I still didn’t know where the house was. I already didn’t like being here.

I got out of the car and searched for the driveway. I found something that maybe was supposed to be a driveway, but I didn’t think my car would fit, so I had to walk the long distance from the road to the front door.

Parked beside the house was a hearse. I don’t know how it could have gotten through that driveway, but there it was all the same. For a moment I thought I saw someone looking at me from the back window, but I blinked and there was no one there.

Surprisingly, the old house had a doorbell, and as I rang it, I smelled something…kind of like rotting meat. I opened the pizza box to make sure it wasn’t the pizza, and when it wasn’t, I started looking around the porch. There, only partially obscured by the bushes, were two dead Siamese cats, and they looked like they had been there a long time. No one was answering the door, so I went over and looked at the nearest cat.

The cat was missing a big part of the side of its body; it kind of looked like it had been eaten. The missing piece was large, but it looked like something with a smaller mouth had just chewed the poor thing up. I nudged the body with my foot, to make sure it was real, and to see if some miracle had happened and the cat was still alive. Neither of them was. The only thing alive was the group of maggots squirming around. I turned away quickly, so as to not throw up on the person’s pizza.

Still no one had come to the door. I rang again. It was getting dark outside. The trees were starting to look like skeletons, the branches into arms, the trunks into huge bodies, and seemed to reach out to me. But this was crazy! My imagination was just getting the best of me.

Finally, I heard the door unlock, and a short man slowly opened it, about 4 ½ feet tall. “Yes? He asked.

One of the eyes was a glass eye. I tried not to stare, and to hide the nervousness I felt. “Sir, I’m from Dominos Pizza. Someone here ordered one. It was our special today; I’ll need $4.23.” Please let me out of here”, I thought.

“Pizza? Who ordered a pizza? He turned around, and slowly, word by word, elevated his voice into a yell. “Who ordered this pizza? I didn’t ask for one! Get in here, all of you!” From all directions came a woman, a small child, probably around 6 years old, a very old golden retriever that was limping, and an old man with no hair and a cane. “Which one of you ordered this pizza?”

The dog rubbed against the short man’s leg. Everyone stared in dumb silence. All I wanted to do was leave.

Then the child stepped forward. “I did it.”

“I’ll have no more of this nonsense! This is just one of your jokes again, and for that, you’ll get no dinner.” He paused and looked at me. “But, since you brought such a wonderful young man here, you can have him.”

I looked around at everyone, and they all stared with lifeless expressions except for the child. “Uh, sir, who’s going to pay for this pizza? I have other deliveries to make.” I tried to take a step back out the door.

The little child came and pulled me in. “My name’s Daniel.” He grinned a very disturbing grin. “This is Mr. Henson. That woman is Miss Vanessa, the dog is named Gracious, and the old man is my best friend. His name is Harold.” He began pulling me to the middle of the room, and I was so scared, I wasn’t able to resist. Something wasn’t exactly right here. I wanted to leave.

“Why, hello there,” Harold said. He winked at Daniel. “Come on in, share the pizza with us. We’ll pay you double the price. Don’t be shy.”

Before I could think for another second, the door was closed and locked, and I was trapped. Gracious was obviously guarding the front door. If I could just break free of these people, I could beat her. I mean, she was limping. How fast can she go?

Mr. Henson took the pizza out of my hands. “Why don’t you take him to your room, Daniel, or go give him a ‘tour.’”

My paralysis broke. “I don’t know who you people are, but I have to leave. You’ve, uh, been very kind in asking me inside, but I’ll get fired if I don’t get back to my job.” I stepped toward the door and Gracious was on my leg in a heartb3eat, and I saw blood start leaking through my pants. “Oh my God!” I Yelled. “Get this thing off!” Miss Vanessa called the dog, and I didn’t know what to do.

“Okay, Mr. Henson, I’ll show him around the house.” Daniel held my hand. “Come on sir, I want to show you all of my toys!”

Daniel led me upstairs, and everyone except the dog left the room in a different direction. It seemed like a mansion.

On the way up there were portraits hanging on the wall. It definitely was a whole family, but I didn’t know whose, considering that everyone in the house seemed not to be related. When Daniel flipped on the light switch, I yelled when I saw a tarantula on top of his head.

“I see you’ve noticed Pete,” he said before I could warn him. “He always comes along with me. Let’s go.”

I don’t know what was wrong with me, but willingly I followed Daniel up the rickety staircase. The house was in need of some repairs. I figured I could do it myself. The fact that I didn’t live there seemed to have eluded me. The eerie feeling in the air entranced me.

Daniel and I stepped into a room, and for some reason I was not surprised at what I saw. There was a biology set, and a frog was pinned to a table for dissection. And the most memorable thing of all was a miniature gas chamber.

“What’s that?” I asked.

“It’s a gas chamber. Would you like to see inside? It’s been a while since I’ve had to kill anyone.”

Kill anyone? This little kid was a murderer? I figured he was strange, but not that strange. I shook my head.

“Oh, come on. It’ll be neat.” He walked over and opened the door. I was horrified to see a skeleton sitting inside, its empty sockets staring sightlessly through me.

“Sorry, kid,” I said, making my way to the door. “I gotta go.”

“No, you don’t,” Daniel said. He smiled. There were two fangs on the upper teeth of his mouth. “Stay and have fun!”

Daniel ran and shoved me into the gas chamber and closed the door. I couldn’t get out. Then I heard the hissing sound of a poisonous gas being filtered into the small compartment.

“Let me out! Let me out!” I yelled. But it was no use. If I had to be killed by a kid, I guess I could go with dignity. It was obvious no one else in the house was going to come and help me. I think they were all conspirators.

I sat in there for what seemed like an hour and nothing happened. Then I saw Daniel begin opened the door. “How d’ya feel?” he asked me.

“What’s wrong with you?” I said as I shoved my way out to breathe in clear oxygen. “You’re sick! Where are your parents?”

“Oh, they’re busy. Someone came around selling Bibles last night. I didn’t get to do anything to him. I have something else to show.”

I followed obediently, and we went downstairs, then outside, past the hearse. This time I knew there was something in there, because there was a tapping on the window. A wrinkled, rotting face looked at me through the glass, smiling a toothless grim, putting blood and squirming maggots on the window.

I turned and threw up. Daniel laughed at me, and said, “Oh, that’s Harold’s wife. She’s been trapped in there for a while. I did her in one night. I just couldn’t help it. I filled up a special water gun with some acid and hit her face with it. Then I just stabbed her. I felt bad at first, but Harold was glad. ‘Finally I’m rid of the old bad’ he had said to me. That was how we became best friends.”

I dropped on my knees. “Please let me go. I’ll never come again. I won’t ever say anything about this.” I was thinking about my wife at home. “I just want to go home” I began to cry.

“Oh, Shut UP!” he said as he slapped my face. “Shut up and come on! Don’t act like a baby!” He smiled, showing off his fangs.

“No,” I said, still crying. “I can’t go! What’s wrong with you? Please! I need to go home to my wife. Don’t kill me.”

Daniel got a look of rage on his face. “I killed those two cats out front. Took each one and ate the sides off ‘em. It was tasty, except the fur made me sneeze a little. I oughta do the same to you, but I’ve got a better idea.”

I was so weak with fear, and almost in acceptance of my inevitable death, that I didn’t struggle as Daniel tied my feet and hands together, and then tied me to a tree. I didn’t know what he was going to do exactly, but I didn’t see any point in fighting.

“See this here?” he asked, pulling something out from inside a hole in a tree. “This is your way to die. Ha.”

Daniel placed the time bomb beside me. “A bomb? How original is that?” I asked sarcastically.

“You’ll see.”

“I don’t want to.”

“Shut UP!” he yelled again and kicked me in the shin.

After setting the bomb, Daniel left and went back to the house. I didn’t yell. I watched the time tick by slowly. One second at a time. It was the clock telling me how much longer I’d live. I only had a minute left.

I listened to the ticking and closed my eyes. The end was coming.

5…4…3…2…

I braced myself and tried to be brave.

1………nothing.

I opened my eyes. It hadn’t exploded. Daniel was up in his room laughing at me through the window. It had been a joke! What a sick little kid! What a sick family! I had to get out of there.

I squirmed and found that Daniel really hadn’t tied me up tightly. He wanted me to get away. He had gotten his laugh.

I walked out front. The cats were gone. The trees seemed normal. The driveway seemed wider. I didn’t see any corpses staring at me from the hearse. It had all been my imagination. Fear can certainly do something to your mind. Thank God I was alive.

I looked back once more to see the whole group in the upstairs window, laughing and waving. They all had fangs except for the old man. But he laughed the hardest.

As I stepped out of the yard onto the street and got into my car, a song came on the radio. “I Wish I was Dead.” I changed the station, but it was on each one. But, I knew it was only my imagination. And I drove straight until I reached the end of the road and dove right into the nearby lake. It wasn’t real. I wasn’t really drowning. It’s all in the head, I told myself, as I grew peaceful with the lack of oxygen. It’s all in the head.

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