You are alone in a century-old house with a basement that smells of wet dirt, decaying potatoes, mildew and fuel oil. It’s a basement that surely harbors the graves of people who lived in this house right after the Civil War and probably died of wounds suffered in that war or at the hands of disgruntled Indians seeking to reclaim their land. You are alone in a house with a basement that contains a dirty, dark room once used to store coal. Who knows what gangster from the 1920s or 30s is hidden just behind the plastered walls of that room, the flesh long gone from bones still standing erect, hands and feet still bound from the day they walled him in alive for some breach of gangster etiquette.
Worst of all, as you realize just how alone you are in this house, is the thought which bursts unbidden into your brain: you are just inches above a creature that thrives on basement environments such as yours. All that separates you from IT are a few flimsy floorboards. You know, and IT knows. "IT" is the most unnerving of house monsters, because this one can actually be seen, heard, even touched (!), day or night. IT is the Furnace Monster.
How could your mother not be home when you got there? You count on her to be here doing mom things, because somehow, she keeps the monsters of the house at bay. Perhaps they fear discovery and banishment by a grown up, or maybe they simply can't fathom the full extent of her power, since monsters don't have mothers. Or maybe they DO have mothers, and it's out of respect or fear that they remain dormant in her presence. You know your mother couldn't beat anything more scary than an egg, but the monsters always stay away when she's home. Today, though, she is not. It's just you and IT.
Growing up during the 60s in Redwood Falls, Minnesota (pop. 4774), we really did live in an old house with an ancient basement, a fruit/root cellar, an old coal bin and an even more ancient furnace. Once a coal-burning unit, it had been converted by some mad scientist into a fuel-oil burning furnace, probably just after the discovery of oil. I would not be surprised to discover that this furnace was designed when man still lived in caves and dinosaurs had not yet decomposed into rich pools of petroleum under Texas and Kuwait.
Unlike today’s compact, ninety-nine percent efficient gas furnaces with whisper-quiet motors and plastic PVC-pipe exhaust chimneys, ours was a room-size behemoth with asbestos octopus tentacles for ductwork. There were spaces around the door on the front through which a small boy could catch glimpses of the fires of Hell. Surely this was a gateway to the Underworld, and I knew if I ever opened the door I would have been sucked inside and carried down the River Styx by a skeletal boatman. You could almost hear the howling hounds of Hell guarding the gates each time the furnace kicked on. Plus, IT was sentient. This was not just a piece of equipment, IT was alive.
Whenever I was home alone, the furnace knew. No matter where I was in the house, IT would cause the ductwork nearest to me to go "clunk," so I would know that IT knew I was alone. Sometimes IT would make a series of clunks around the house, causing my head to snap from side to side as I tried to keep IT from sneaking up on me from behind. That's the nature of house monsters, you know. They torment you like a cat with no appetite that has caught a mouse. It plays with its terrified prey, allowing it to almost escape, but always hooking it back at the last moment with a razor-sharp claw.
House monsters will drive you crazy by being everywhere and nowhere at the same time. You feel its malicious presence as you try to go through your normal routine, but are unable to because of the feeling of eyes boring through your back. IT knows you are alone. IT knows you are small, and IT knows you fear its awesome size and power.
IT inhabits that dark, hidden-away part of your house where sunlight never gains the upper hand. Disgusting, many-legged insects scurry when the lights are turned on, insects with so many legs they look as though they must have once been many insects all running in single file until a sudden stop compressed them together into a single organism. IT lives where people are loath to go, hidden in the dark corners where spiders set their traps, and flashlights can never fully illuminate.
Grown-ups usually deny the existence of the Furnace Monster, but if you could wipe clear the windowpane to their memories, and sift through the images inside, you'd find a dark corner where flames dance red and yellow, and tiny streaks of light escape through the gaps around the heavy metal door. It is there, forced back into a small, gloomy corner, perhaps, but still there: The Furnace Monster.
If you don't believe me, just ask a friend some time if he or she remembers the Furnace Monster. Watch their eyes. They remember. They know.
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