The Dungeon

From the time I was about five until I was a pre-teen, about eleven or twelve I guess, I showered in a dungeon. It didn't have any shackles or torture devices but was every bit as dark and gloomy as I imagine a medievil prison would be.

My bedroom was on the second floor as was the linen closet. I would have to go through the house with only a towel on. Our house was never empty. Either my younger brother or sister would usually have friends around to harass me for being half naked. That or my dad and his friends wouldn't notice I was half naked and stop me to ask about my affairs.

After making it through to the cellar door I made my way down past the winter coats and tools hung on either wall. The musty, damp smell lunged at you as you were met by the huge black oil tank at the bottom of the stairs. Going around the corner past ramshackle stacks of furniture long forgotten I made it to the entrance of the bulkhead. The entryway was usually guarded by pillars of beach chairs and summer toys that hid in the basement until called upon every other weekend during the summer months. Finally you stood before it, a tall metallic, rusted water chamber. It reminded me of the containers magicians would attempt to escape from under water. Leaving my towel in the mouth of the unused and out of date stove perched next to the shower I would enter it's gaping jaws. The soap and shampoo was always hung just out of reach making it an even more traumatic chore.

As years went on the exposed pipes would wail and shake, screaming at me as a reminder of who ruled over the basement underworld. Accounts differ on the origin of this beast and it is unclear what became of it. At long last my parents completely remodeled the upstairs bathroom. We forgot the chamber that lurked in the basement. Ironically, after remodeling, our family sold the house about six months later. It was rumored that the new family finished the attic space. As for the basement nobody knows. It is even possible that it still hides in the dungeon collecting mold and waiting on some unsuspecting, curuios, and dirty child.